UORARY 


Outlines  of  the  History  of 

German    Literature 


BY 


J.   G.    ROBERTSON 

PROFESSOR    OF  GERMAN    IN    THE    UNIVERSITY   OF   LONDON 


NEW     YORK 

G.    P.    PUTNAM'S     SONS 

EDINBURGH    AND    LONDON 

WILLIAM     BLACKWOOD    AND     SONS 

1911 


ALL    RIGHTS   RESERVED 


Printed  by 
WILLIAM  BLACKWOOD  &  SONS,  Edinburgh,  Scotland. 


PREFACE. 


THE  present  little  volume  is  long  overdue ;  it 
was  originally  my  intention  to  accompany  my 
History  of  German  Literature  with  a  briefer  in- 
troduction to  the  subject,  and  a  considerable  part 
of  the  present  book  dates  back  to  the  time  of  my 
occupation  with  the  History.  The  point  of  view 
from  which  I  have  regarded  the  subject  will  be 
found  to  be  not  essentially  different  from  that  of 
the  larger  book ;  and,  as  in  the  latter,  I  have 
considered  it  advisable  to  keep  as  far  as  possible  to 
accepted  judgments,  rather  than  to  obtrude  diver- 
gent personal  views  which  in  a  book  of  this  scope 
there  is  not  room  to  support.  The  economy  of 
space  compared  with  the  larger  book  has  been 
attained  by  the  suppression  of  detail  concerning 
minor  writers ;  the  chief  writers  and  works  have, 
on  the  other  hand,  been  dealt  with  on  what  may 
seem  a  disproportionate  scale.  But  this  is  inevit- 
able in  a  small  book.  Apart  from  this,  my 
effort  has  been  rather  to  lay  down  general  lines 


VI  PREFACE. 

of  development  than  to  heap  up  biographical  or 
critical  detail.  The  book  has  been  provided  with 
somewhat  extensive  chronological  tables  ;  the  reader 
will,  I  believe,  find  the  parallel  tabulation  of  events 
in  English  and  other  literatures  useful  in  helping 
him  to  "place"  the  phenomena  and  movements  of 
German  literature. 

To  my  colleague,  Prof.  R.  Priebsch,  I  have  to 
express  my  warm  thanks  for  his  valuable  aid  in 
reading  the  proof-sheets  of  the  earlier  chapters. 

J.  G.  ROBERTSON. 

LONDON,  October  1911. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAP.  PAGE 

PREFACE         .  .  .  .  V 

INTRODUCTORY          .....  1 

I.   THE   OLD    HIGH    GERMAN    PERIOD   ...  4 

II.    THE     BEGINNINGS     OF     MIDDLE     HIGH      GERMAN 

POETRY      .  .  .  .  .  -13 

III.  THE    POPULAR    EPIC  .  .  .20 

IV.  THE    COURT    EPIC      .  .  .  .  .32 
V.    MINNESANG   AND   DIDACTIC   POETRY              .  .  47 

VI.    THE    TRANSITION    FROM    MEDIAEVAL    TO    MODERN 

LITERATURE  .....  57 

VII.    HUMANISM   AND   THE    REFORMATION  .  .  67 

VIII.    THE    RENAISSANCE    IN   GERMANY     .  .  -79 

IX.    THE    LATER   SEVENTEENTH    CENTURY          .  .  90 

X.    FRENCH    CLASSICISM    AND    ENGLISH    NATURALISM  99 

XI.    SAXON       AND       PRUSSIAN        LITERARY       CIRCLES  ; 

KLOPSTOCK  .  .  .  .  .109 

XII.    LESSING          .  .  .  .  .  .120 

XIII.  WIELAND        AND        HERDER  ;        THE        GOTTINGKK 

DICHTERBUND        .  .  .  .  .130 

XIV.  GOETHE    AND    THE    "  STURM    UND    DRANG  "  .          142 

xv.  SCHILLER;  GOETHE'S  FIRST  PERIOD  IN  WEIMAR       154 


Vlll  CONTENTS. 

XVI.  THE  CULMINATION  OF  WEIMAR  CLASSICISM         .  l66 
XVII.  MINOR    WRITERS    OF    THE    CLASSICAL    PERIOD  ; 

GOETHE'S  OLD  AGE         .  .  .  .178 

XVIII.  THE  ROMANTIC  MOVEMENT            .            .            .  192 

XIX.  THE  DRAMA  UNDER  ROMANTIC  INFLUENCE          .  209 

XX.  LITERATURE  IN  SWABIA  AND  AUSTRIA      .            .  222 

XXI.  THE  END  OF  ROMANTICISM            .            .            .  231 

XXII.  YOUNG  GERMANY  AND  THE  POLITICAL  LYRIC     .  24! 

XXIII.  MIDCENTURY  FICTION         ....  254 

XXIV.  NEW  BEGINNINGS  IN  THE  DRAMA  ;  THE  MUNICH 

SCHOOL      ......  265 

XXV.    GERMAN    LITERATURE    SINCE    1870                   .                  .  277 


CHRONOLOGICAL   TABLES      ....         287 
INDEX  ...  .         312 


Outlines  of  the 
History  of  German   Literature 


INTRODUCTORY. 

THE  race-name  by  which  we  designate  to-day  the  domin- 
ating nation  on  the  European  continent  has  undergone 
several  changes  of  definition.  Originally,  if  we  may  trust 
a  probable  Keltic  derivation  of  the  word,  applied  to  the 
"  neighbouring "  tribes,  which  the  Roman  invaders  of 
Gaul  found  opposing  them  on  the  banks  of  the  Rhine, 
the  word  "  German  "  has  been  adopted  by  us  to  describe 
the  people  who  know  themselves  as  "  Deutsche.''  German 
or  Deutsch  was  the  strong  empire  which,  for  centuries,  in 
the  darker  epochs  of  European  history,  held  the  balance 
between  the  nationalities  of  the  continent ;  German  or 
Deutsch  was  the  name  by  which  the  small  German- 
speaking  states  of  Northern  Europe  had,  since  the  close 
of  the  Middle  Ages,  described  the  common  bond  that 
held  them  together ;  and  German  or  Deutsch  is  the  new 
empire  which  emerged  from  the  last  great  European  war. 
The  word,  however,  calls  up,  in  the  first  instance,  a  racial 
and  linguistic  tie,  not  a  political  one,  and  German  litera- 
ture means  for  us  not  the  literature  of  the  German 
Empire  alone,  but  also  that  of  the  German  -  speaking 
population  of  Austria  and  Switzerland. 


2  INTRODUCTORY. 

This  interpretation  of  the  word  "German"  as 
"  German-speaking "  is,  however,  subject  to  considerable 
modification  when  we  penetrate  a  few  centuries  back  into 
the  past  of  the  people  whose  literature  we  have  to  study. 
The  early  history  of  all  literatures  is,  of  necessity,  a  history 
of  writings  in  dialects,  not  in  one  recognised  national 
speech  ;  and  this  is  particularly  true  in  the  present  case. 
Centuries  elapsed  before  the  German  races  became  the 
possessors  of  a  common  literary  language ;  and  a  history 
like  the  present  has,  in  its  earlier  chapters,  to  take 
cognisance  of  the  poetic  expression  of  many  races,  speak- 
ing widely  different  dialects. 

The  various  stages  in  the  History  of  the  German 
Language  afford  obviously  the  most  natural  divisions  for 
a  history  of  the  works  written  in  that  language.  An  Old 
High  German  Period  of  linguistic  growth  was  followed  by 
a  Middle  High  German  Period,  and  this,  again,  by  a  New, 
or  Modern  High  German  Period.  In  the  same  way  we  are 
able  to  distinguish  three  great  stages  of  development  in 
the  literature  :  I.  The  Old  High  German  Period,  extend- 
ing from  about  750  to  1050,  a  period  of  tentative  begin- 
nings, composed  in  many  dialects,  the  most  important 
monuments  being,  indeed,  not  in  High  German  at  all, 
but  in  Low  German ;  II.  The  Middle  High  German 
Period,  from  about  1050  to  about  1350,  which  includes 
the  flourishing  -  period  of  German  mediaeval  poetry,  a 
period  of  great  but  short-lived  intensity  at  the  beginning 
of  the  thirteenth  century;  and  III.  The  Modern  High 
German  Period,  from  about  1350  onwards.  It  is  usual 
to  subdivide  this  last  period  into  an  Early  New  High 
German  Period,  extending  to  about  the  end  of  the  seven- 
teenth century,  an  age  in  which  the  language  was  still 
more  or  less  in  a  condition  of  flux,  and  a  later  period 
embracing  the  two  last  centuries,  in  which  Modern 
German  had  attained  its  definite  classical  form. 

This  grouping  of  German  literature  is  not,  however, 
based  merely  on  linguistic  distinctions.  The  literature 
itself,  which  in  its  development  was  peculiarly  chequered 
and  irregular,  falls  naturally  into  the  divisions  that  have 


DIVISIONS   OF   GERMAN    LITERATURE.  3 

been  mentioned.  Between  the  Old  High  German  Period 
and  the  Middle  High  German  Period  there  was  a  complete 
break  in  the  literary  tradition,  or  at  least  in  the  records 
of  that  tradition,  hardly  a  line  having  come  down  to  us 
in  the  vernacular  from  a  period  little  short  of  a  century; 
and  between  Middle  High  German  poetry  and  the  new 
beginnings  of  the  Reformation  century  lay  an  age  of 
depression  and  mediocre  achievement  which  more  effect- 
ually broke  the  continuity  of  mediaeval  traditions  than 
the  social  changes  which  ushered  in  the  modern  period. 
Again,  the  century  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War — a  century 
comparatively  barren  in  literary  production  in  Germany 
— intervened  between  the  period  of  the  Reformation  and 
the  classicism  of  the  eighteenth  century.  And,  if  a  divi- 
sion has  to  be  made  in  the  enormous  literary  production 
since  1700,  the  two  words  "Classic"  and  "Romantic" 
which  stand,  in  Germany  at  least,  for  two  diametrically 
opposed  literary  creeds,  make  it  possible  to  draw  a 
boundary  line  between  the  eighteenth  and  nineteenth 
centuries. 


CHAPTER    I. 

THE    OLD    HIGH    GERMAN    PERIOD. 

WHEN  we  first  meet  the  Germanic  races  on  the  threshold 
of  history,  they  consist  of  scattered  tribes,  more  or  less 
unsettled,  occupying  the  great  plains  of  north-western 
Europe,  the  peninsula  of  Scandinavia,  and  even  extending 
as  far  south-east  as  the  lower  reaches  of  the  Danube.  Our 
knowledge  of  these  peoples  in  the  first  century  of  our 
era  is  drawn  from  Roman  writers,  from  Julius  Qesar  who 
had  fought  against  them,  and  from  Tacitus,  who  described 
them  in  his  Germania  (written  in  98)  and  Annals.  Like 
all  primitive  races,  the  ancient  Germans  possessed  an 
unwritten  poetry.  Tacitus  tells  us  that  they  celebrated 
their  heroes  in  song,  and  they  had  also  hymns  and 
battle-songs.  But  we  have  no  actual  records  from  this  early 
period ;  and,  indeed,  it  is  unlikely  that  the  art  of  writing 
was  known  to  the  Germans  of  whom  Tacitus  wrote. 
Their  Runic  alphabet,  a  rough  imitation  of  some  of  the 
Latin  letters,  was  not  in  general  use  for  inscriptions 
until  at  least  the  end  of  the  second  century. 

The  Germanic  race,  which  had  made  its  home  on  the 
Lower  Danube — a  branch  of  the  group  known  as  Goths 
— was,  as  a  consequence  of  its  proximity  to  the  older 
civilisations  of  the  south  of  Europe,  intellectually  the 
most  advanced.  About  the  middle  of  the  fourth  century, 
long  before  any  other  Germanic  people  possessed  a  written 
literature,  and  when  England  was  still  a  Roman  province, 
a  bishop  of  these  Goths,  Wulfila,  or,  according  to  the 
Greek  form  of  the  name,  Ulphilas,  conceived  the  plan  of 


THE    GOTHIC    BIBLE.  5 

giving  his  people  the  Bible  in  their  own  tongue.  Wulfila, 
who  lived  from  311  to  about  382,  and  was  consecrated  in 
341,  not  only  translated  into  a  language  which  had  never 
before  been  employed  for  literary  purposes,  but  he  had 
to  invent  the  very  letters  which  he  used.  He  adopted 
the  Greek  alphabet,  helping  out  its  deficiencies  with  the 
Latin  and  Runic  alphabets.  Only  a  small  part  of  the 
Gothic  Bible  has  been  preserved  to  us,  and  that  mainly 
the  gospels,  but  it  is  of  inestimable  importance  for  the 
history  of  the  Germanic  languages.  Regarded  as  a  trans- 
lation, it  also  shows  literary  skill  of  a  high  order ;  for  the 
Gothic  language  attained  in  Wulfila's  hands  a  flexibility 
and  a  grace  which  it  would  be  difficult  to  parallel  in  the 
early  history  of  any  other  Germanic  dialect. 

This  brilliant  beginning  to  a  Gothic  literature  was,  how- 
ever, only  a  beginning ;  Wulfila  virtually  stands  alone  ;  and 
at  the  end  of  the  fourth  century  a  great  catastrophe  broke 
over  the  Germanic  world  which  retarded  immeasurably 
the  intellectual  growth  of  these  races.  The  Huns,  a  wild 
Mongolian  horde,  broke  into  Europe  from  the  East,  and 
drove  the  Germans  out  of  their  settlements.  In  the  fierce 
struggles  of  the  so-called  "  Volkervvanderung  "  or  Migra- 
tions, the  distribution  of  nationalities  over  the  face  of 
Europe  was  completely  changed  and  the  Roman  Empire 
received  a  shock  from  which  it  never  recovered.  And 
just  as  in  ancient  Greece  the  conflicts  of  opposing  races 
on  the  coasts  of  Asia  Minor  provided  the  materials  out 
of  which  the  national  epic  of  the  Greeks  was  formed,  so 
we  owe  to  the  Migrations  the  national  epic-sagas  of  the 
Germanic  races.  The  stories  of  Siegfried  and  Attila,  of 
the  Burgundians,  who  had  been  annihilated  by  the  Huns 
in  437,  and  of  Ermanarich  and  Theodorich,  gradually 
took  shape  amidst  these  struggles  for  national  existence. 
Often,  too,  old  nature-myths,  the  common  heritage  of  all 
the  Aryan  peoples,  were,  in  the  sagas,  associated  and 
blended  with  the  historical  events.  But  centuries  of  oral 
tradition  had  to  elapse  before  they  crystallised  into 
literature  in  the  Eddas  of  the  Scandinavians  and  the 
Nibelungenlied  of  the  Germans.  The  continental  Ger- 


6  THE    OLD    HIGH    GERMAN    PERIOD. 

manic  races  —  to  whom  we  have  henceforth  to  limit 
ourselves — were  naturally  more  exposed  to  such  unset- 
tling conflicts  than  their  cousins  in  Scandinavia  or  in 
England,  and  their  intellectual  awakening  was  proportion- 
ately longer  in  coming  ;  the  Anglo-Saxons  had  their  epic 
of  Beowulf  long  before  we  have  evidence  of  any  similar 
development  among  the  Germans. 

Beyond  two  interesting  charms,  the  so-called  Merseburg 
Charms  (Merseburger  Zauberspriiche),  of  a  wholly  heathen 
nature,  only  one  fragment  of  early  German  literature 
points  back  indubitably  to  the  heroic  time  of  the  Migra- 
tions. This  is  the  Hildebrandslied  or  Lay  of  Hilde- 
brand, written  about  800  in  the  monastery  of  Fulda;  it 
is  only  a  fragment  of  sixty -eight  lines  of  alliterative 
verse,  this  being  the  primitive  form  of  Germanic  poetry 
in  which  the  links  binding  the  lines  together  consist,  not 
of  end -rhymes,  but  of  accentuated  syllables  beginning 
with  the  same  sound.  Hildebrand  is  a  vassal  of  Theo- 
dorich's,  who,  when  the  latter  is  defeated  by  Odoaker, 
flees  eastward  and  takes  refuge  with  the  Huns.  Thirty 
years  elapse,  and  the  old  warrior  is  now  on  his  way  home 
to  wife  and  child.  He  finds  himself  confronted  by  a 
young  fighter  in  whom  he  recognises  his  own  son  Hadu- 
brand  ;  he  joyfully  offers  the  youth  the  arm-ring  which 
Attila  has  given  him.  But  the  impetuous  Hadubrand 
only  sees  in  the  old  man's  generosity  a  ruse  to  escape 
a  conflict ;  he  insists  on  measuring  arms  with  him. 
Hildebrand  pleads  in  vain,  and  the  fight  takes  place. 
The  fragment  breaks  off  here,  but  there  is  little  doubt 
that  the  story  ended  tragically :  Hadubrand  is  slain  by 
his  own  father. 

This  grim  tragedy,  which  meets  us  on  the  very  thresh- 
old of  German  literature,  is  one  of  the  most  precious 
specimens  of  primitive  literature  we  possess  ;  it  is  also 
much  the  most  interesting  literary  monument  that  has 
come  down  to  us  from  the  earliest  period  of  German 
literary  history.  The  magnificent  directness  and  inten- 
sity of  this  old  lay,  the  fierceness  of  its  irony,  seem 
to  take  us  back  to  the  very  headspring  of  tragedy.  The 


CHARLES   THE    GREAT.  7 

heathen  spirit  has  also  left  its  traces  on  an  alliterative 
fragment  of  a  prayer,  the  so-called  Wessobrunner  Gebet 
(end  of  the  eighth  century),  which  opens  with  some  lines 
describing  the  creation  of  the  world ;  and  it  appears  again 
in  the  fragmentary  Muspilli  (ca.  850),  where  the  end  of 
the  world  is  described  by  a  poet  whose  imagination  had 
possibly  been  fired  by  the  early  Germanic  conception  of 
that  catastrophe. 

But  however  much  or  little  of  pre-Christian  ideas  these 
literary  fragments  contain,  not  one  of  them  is,  in  the  form 
in  which  it  has  been  preserved  to  us,  older  than  the  reign 
of  Charles  the  Great.  With  this  great  German  emperor, 
called  by  his  French-speaking  subjects  Charlemagne,  the 
centre  of  political  power  in  Europe  was  for  the  first  time 
established  north  of  the  Alps  ;  he  welded  his  people,  the 
Franks,  into  a  great  nation  which  dominated  the  Roman- 
ised portion  of  Gaul  as  well  as  all  the  West  Germanic 
tribes  of  the  continent.  The  history  of  German  litera- 
ture as  a  written  literature  begins  with  Charles  the  Great, 
whose  reign  extended  from  768  to  814.  When  Charles 
came  into  power,  one  of  his  first  cares  was  to  strengthen 
the  hands  of  the  Church,  which  had  already,  thanks 
mainly  to  the  Anglo-Saxon  "  Apostle  of  the  Germans," 
Winfrith  or  Bonifacius  (ca.  680-755),  gained  a  hold  upon 
the  German  peoples.  He  encouraged  the  scholarly  ac- 
tivity of  the  monasteries  and  impressed  upon  the  monks 
the  necessity  of  interpreting  the  doctrines  of  Christianity 
to  the  people  in  their  own  tongue.  Thus  the  majority 
of  the  earliest  specimens  of  the  German  vernacular  at 
the  close  of  the  eighth  and  beginning  of  the  ninth  cen- 
turies consist  of  Latin -German  vocabularies  or  Glosses, 
translations  of  the  Church  liturgy  and  the  like.  The 
best  of  these  translations  from  the  time  of  Charles  the 
Great  is  one  of  a  theological  tract  by  the  Church  Father 
Isidore,  and  a  fragment  of  this  with  part  of  the  Gospel 
of  St  Matthew  and  two  sermons  is  also  preserved  in  the 
Monseer  Fragmente,  from  the  monastery  of  Monsee  in 
Upper  Austria.  These  are  much  superior  to  the  more 
voluminous  translation  of  Tatian's  Gospel  -  Harmony 


8  THE    OLt)    HIGH    GERMAN    PERIOD. 

(Evangelienharmonie),  made  some  thirty  years  later  (about 
835)  in  the  monastery  of  Fulda,  a  monastery  which, 
under  the  great  churchman,  Rabanus  Maurus,  had  be- 
come, together  with  Reichenau  and  St  Gall,  one  of  the 
chief  fountainheads  of  light  in  these  dark  ages.  Charles 
the  Great's  interest  in  the  intellectual  welfare  of  his 
nation  was  not,  however,  limited  to  ecclesiastical  and 
scholastic  reforms  ;  he  concerned  himself  with  their 
secular  culture  and  even  had  a  collection  made  of  the 
songs  of  the  people. 

The  two  lengthiest  monuments  of  old  German  poetry 
belong  to  the  ninth  century.  These  are  the  Heliand 
("The  Saviour"),  together  with  fragments  of  Genesis, 
written  about  830  in  Old  Saxon  alliterative  verse,  during 
the  reign  of  Charles  the  Great's  son  and  successor, 
Ludwig  the  Pious,  and  the  Evangelienbuch  or  Gospel- 
Book,  composed  more  than  thirty  years  later  by  the 
Alsatian  monk  Otfrid.  The  familiarity  which  the  un- 
known poet  of  the  Heliand  and  Genesis — which  were 
possibly  only  parts  of  a  version  of  the  entire  Bible — 
shows  with  the  form  of  the  old  Germanic  epic  has  led  to 
the  belief  that  he  was  one  of  those  wandering  singers  who 
are  to  be  met  with  all  through  the  dark  ages  of  European 
history  at  the  courts  of  kings  and  nobles.  From  the 
subject  and  treatment  of  his  poem  we  might  perhaps  also 
infer  that  part  of  his  life,  at  least,  had  been  passed  in 
a  monastery,  probably  not  far  from  the  sea,  in  the  low- 
lying  land  between  Weser  and  Elbe ;  this  at  least  is  the 
scenery  which  forms  the  background  of  the  poem.  On 
the  other  hand,  there  is  considerable  ground  for  the 
opinion  that  this  Old  Saxon  biblical  poem  is  not  the 
work  of  one  hand.  The  Heliand  is  a  genuine  epic  of 
the  life  of  Christ  based  on  the  Gospels,  or  rather  on 
a  Harmony  of  the  four  Gospels  ;  its  language  is  simple 
and  noble,  ornamented  only  by  the  direct  and  forcible 
phrases  of  the  old  alliterative  speech.  Christ  is  here 
a  prince  who  shows  favour  to  his  faithful  followers  by 
bestowing,  like  the  hero  of  a  Germanic  saga,  gifts  of  arm- 
rings  on  them;  the  places  he  moves  among,  "Nazareth- 


THE    "  HELIAND       AND    OTFRID.  g 

burg,"  "  Bethleemburg,"  "  Rumuburg "  (Rome),  are  the 
Saxon  villages  with  which  the  poet  was  familiar.  Inci- 
dents that  might  lower  the  hero  in  the  listener's  estima- 
tion, such  as  the  entry  into  Jerusalem  on  the  ass,  are 
either  omitted  or  glossed  over,  and  the  old  Germanic 
virtues  of  faithfulness  and  loyalty  kept  continually  in  the 
foreground. 

The  Evangelienbuch  or  Gospel -Book  of  Otfrid  is,  as 
poetry,  much  less  interesting  than  the  Heliand.  It  is 
not  only  strongly  influenced  by  Latin  models  and  by 
the  theological  speculation  of  the  time,  but  it  is  also 
divided  into  sections  which  correspond  to  the  pericopes 
or  lessons  of  the  church  service.  We  know  little  more 
of  Otfrid  than  that  he  was  a  monk  of  the  monastery  of 
Weissenburg ;  he  may  have  been  born  about  800,  and 
lived  to  about  871;  his  poem  appears  to  have  been 
written  subsequent  to  863.  Didactic  and  poetically  un- 
inspired as  Otfrid's  verses  for  the  most  part  are,  they 
mark  more  definitely  an  epoch  in  the  history  of  German 
literature  than  the  Heliand.  The  Heliand  was  the  last 
great  poem  in  alliterative  verse ;  Otfrid's  Gospel-Book  is 
the  first  German  poem  in  rhymed  verse.  Otfrid's  in- 
fluence is  possibly  to  be  traced  on  the  sparing  remains 
of  religious  poetry  that  have  been  preserved  from  the 
later  Old  High  German  period,  such  as  the  Bittgesang  an 
den  heiligen  Petrus,  Christus  und  die  Samariterin,  and  Das 
Lied  vom  heiligen  Georg.  Of  a  secular  lyric  poetry  in 
this  period  no  traces  have  been  preserved,  and  it  is  very 
doubtful  if  the  so-called  "  winileod,"  prohibited  by  a 
Church  decree  of  Charles  the  Great's  time,  come  under 
this  heading.  The  Ludwigslied  (88 1),  a  song  in  honour 
of  a  victory  of  one  of  the  later  Carlovingians,  Ludwig  III., 
although  monkish  in  spirit,  may  be  regarded  as  the 
earliest  ballad  in  German  literature.  De  Heinrico,  a 
short  political  poem  composed  about  1000  and  referring 
to  Otto  I.  and  Heinrich  I.,  may  also  be  mentioned  here ; 
it  is  written  in  alternating  Latin  and  German  lines. 

The  ninth  century,  with  its  two  Biblical  epics,  remains 
the  brightest  in  the  dim  Old  High  German  period.  Thus, 


IO  THE    OLD    HIGH    GERMAN    PERIOD. 

chronologically  speaking,  we  might  say  that  the  flourishing- 
time  of  this  literature  lay  between  the  chief  period  of 
Old  English  poetry  and  that  of  Old  English  prose.  The 
Carlovingian  empire  was  in  842  divided  between  Charles 
the  Great's  two  grandsons,  Ludwig  and  Charles ;  and  this 
division,  which  marks  the  beginning  of  the  independent 
growth  of  the  two  great  nationalities  of  France  and 
Germany,  has  left  its  literary  record  in  the  Strassburger 
Eide  (842),  oaths  sworn  by  the  two  kings  in  the  two 
languages,  at  Strassburg.  The  later  Carlovingian  rulers 
of  the  eastern  Frankish  kingdom  were  not,  however, 
encouragers  of  literature  and  learning ;  a  new  period  of 
darkness  set  in  with  them,  and  this  darkness  only  deep- 
ened, as  far  as  vernacular  literature  was  concerned,  under 
the  successors  of  the  Carlovingians,  the  Saxon  dynasty  (919- 
1024).  The  Saxon  emperors  had  other  and  sterner  tasks 
before  them  in  maintaining  the  integrity  of  their  empire 
against  aggressive  neighbours,  than  that  of  caring  for  the 
spiritual  welfare  or  literature  of  their  people.  But  the 
old  sagas  continued,  notwithstanding,  to  live  on  on  the 
lips  of  the  people,  kept  alive  by  the  wandering  "gleemen  " 
or  "  Spielleute,"  whose  importance  for  the  life  of  those 
times  was  rapidly  growing. 

There  was,  however,  a  kind  of  literary  renaissance  under 
the  Saxon  emperors,  a  renaissance  that  was,  it  is  true,  Latin 
both  in  its  speech  and  in  its  ideas  ;  but  it  produced  a  few 
works  which  cannot  be  overlooked  in  a  history  of  German 
literature.  The  first  of  these  is  the  Latin  epic,  Wal- 
tharius,  written  about  930  by  Ekkehard,  a  monk  of  the 
monastery  of  St  Gall,  a  monastery  which,  all  through 
the  tenth  and  part  of  the  eleventh  centuries,  formed  an 
intellectual  focus  in  Southern  Germany.  Written  in 
polished  Latin  hexameters,  the  Lay  of  Waltharius,  or 
Waltharilied,  is  a  version  of  one  of  the  national  sagas 
which  arose  out  of  the  Migrations  of  the  fifth  century  :  it  is 
a  national  poem  in  Latin  garb.  Walther  of  Aquitaine  and 
his  betrothed,  Hildegund  of  Burgundy,  escape  from  the 
court  of  Attila,  King  of  the  Huns,  who  has  held  them  as 
hostages.  They  ultimately  reach  the  Rhine,  near  Worms ; 


LATIN    LITERATURE.  II 

Gunther,  the  Frankish  king,  who  reigns  at  Worms,  sets 
out  with  twelve  chosen  vassals  to  intercept  the  fugitives 
and  take  possession  of  their  treasure,  to  which  Gunther 
lays  claim.  One  after  the  other  Walther  overcomes  and 
slays  the  king's  vassals,  until  only  Gunther,  Hagen,  and  he 
are  left.  In  a  desperate  encounter  all  three  are  disabled, 
and  Walther  is  allowed  to  proceed  on  his  way  in  peace. 

Another  Latin  poem  of  this  time,  the  Ecbasis  Captivi 
("Escape  of  the  Captive"),  written  about  940  by  a  monk 
of  Lorraine,  is  interesting  as  the  earliest  example  of  the 
"Tierepos"  or  "beast  epic."  Under  the  guise  of  a  calf, 
which  strays  into  the  forest  and  is  seized  by  a  wolf,  but 
is  ultimately  rescued,  the  poet  writes  an  allegory  of  his 
own  life.  The  poem,  however,  has  no  great  merit  as 
literature.  More  interesting,  and  also  more  German  in 
spirit,  is  the  first  romance  in  German  literature,  the  Latin 
poem  known  as  Ruodlieb,  which  was  written  in  the  mon- 
astery of  Tegernsee,  in  Bavaria,  about  the  year  1030. 
Ruodlieb  goes  out  to  seek  his  fortune  in  foreign  lands, 
and  comes  to  the  court  of  a  king,  into  whose  service  he 
enters  ;  he  distinguishes  himself  here  both  as  hunter  and 
soldier.  After  ten  years  he  proposes  to  return  home,  and 
the  king  remunerates  him  with  two  loaves  of  bread  in 
which  are  concealed  money  and  treasures,  and  with  twelve 
maxims,  which  Ruodlieb  prizes  above  all  material  riches. 
The  poet  evidently  intended  that  his  hero  should  go  through 
adventures  on  his  journey  home,  each  of  which  should  illus- 
trate practically  the  wisdom  of  one  of  the  king's  maxims. 
The  poem,  however,  is  fragmentary,  and  the  plan  is  only 
partially  carried  out.  Ruodlieb  is  the  one  poem  of  its 
time  which  foreshadows  the  literary  developments  of  the 
coming  centuries ;  for  it  contains  in  germ  much  of  what 
developed  later  into  the  epic  of  chivalry. 

The  Saxon  nun,  Hrotsuith,  or  Roswitha  of  Ganders- 
heim,  who  lived  in  the  second  half  of  the  tenth  century, 
wrote  a  number  of  Christian  dramas  on  the  model  of 
Terence,  to  counteract  the  latter's  evil  influence  in  the 
monasteries,  although  to  the  modern  mind  the  antidote 
seems  sometimes  worse  than  the  poison.  Hrotsuith  has 


12  THE    OLD    HIGH    GERMAN    PERIOD. 

been  claimed  as  the  first  German-born  dramatist.  Her 
plays,  however,  are  only  legends  in  dialogue  form,  and 
have  no  qualities  that  distinguish  them  as  German  ;  she 
is  a  purely  Latin  writer  of  this  Latin  renaissance. 

But  there  was  one  man  in  this  age  of  Latin  cul- 
ture who  interested  himself  seriously  in  the  language 
of  his  people,  namely,  the  head  of  the  convent  school 
in  the  monastery  of  St  Gall,  who  is  variously  known  as 
Notker  III.,  Notker  the  German,  and  Notker  Labeo 
("the  thick-lipped").  He  lived  from  952  to  1022,  and 
was  consequently  very  nearly  the  exact  contemporary  of 
the  Anglo-Saxon  Aelfric.  Besides  purely  Latin  writings, 
Notker  has  left  a  number  of  manuscripts  of  works  used 
in  the  school  —  Boethius's  De  consolatione  philosophies, 
Aristotle's  Categories  and  Hermeneutics,  that  strange  alle- 
gorical treatise  by  Marcianus  Capella,  so  popular  in  the 
Middle  Ages,  The  Marriage  of  Philology  and  Mercury, — 
and  these,  for  the  benefit  of  his  pupils,  he  interpreted  into 
the  vernacular,  every  few  words  of  Latin  being  accompanied 
by  an  equivalent  translation.  Notker's  translations  are, 
however,  a  good  deal  more  than  mere  schoolman's  work  ; 
they  show  often  considerable  literary  skill  and  a  sense 
for  the  beauty  and  music  of  German  words,  such  as  no 
other  German  of  the  tenth  or  eleventh  centuries  pos- 
sessed. Notker  also  wrote  a  few  shorter  treatises,  collected 
under  the  title  De  mttsica,  exclusively  in  German. 

It  is  usual  to  designate  the  period  which  comes  to  a 
close  with  Notker  of  St  Gall  as  the  Old  High  German 
period  of  German  literature,  after  the  dialect  or  group  of 
dialects  then  spoken  in  southern  Germany.  But  it  is 
well  to  remember  that  by  no  means  all  the  literary 
remains  that  have  come  down  to  us  are  in  High  German 
dialects ;  the  most  important  of  all,  the  Heliand,  is  in  Old 
Saxon,  and  the  Hildebrandslied  contains  Low  German 
elements  which  imply  that  its  preservation  was  due  to 
a  Low  German  tradition. 


CHAPTER    II. 

THE    BEGINNINGS    OF    MIDDLE    HIGH    GERMAN    POETRY. 

THE  revival  of  German  vernacular  poetry  after  its  long 
sleep  of  more  than  a  century  was  slow  and  tentative. 
The  absence  of  written  records  undoubtedly  facilitated 
a  great  change  which,  at  the  beginning  of  the  twelfth 
century,  came  over  the  Old  High  German  dialects.  The 
degeneration — if  degeneration  it  may  be  called — to  which 
all  languages  unfixed  by  a  written  literature  are  prone, 
had  proceeded  rapidly  throughout  the  eleventh  century, 
and  about  the  year  noo  the  High  German  speech  re- 
appears denuded  of  the  varied  flexional  endings  and  the 
wide  range  of  vowel  sounds  which  made  Old  High 
German  the  richest  and  most  musical  of  all  the  older 
Germanic  dialects.  Middle  High  German  speech,  com- 
pared with  its  predecessor,  seems  colourless  and  mono- 
tonous ;  its  phonology  has  become  simplified,  the  a,  i,  o, 
and  u  of  the  original  flexions  being,  for  the  most  part, 
reduced  to  a  uniform  e ;  and  its  accidence  has  undergone 
a  similar  levelling  process. 

The  growth  of  a  secular  literature  was  retarded  by 
the  religious  temper  of  the  time ;  for  in  the  eleventh 
century  a  wave  of  monastic  asceticism,  which  originated 
in  the  Burgundian  monastery  of  Cluny,  spread  over 
Europe  and  was  directly  hostile  to  any  literature  not 
immediately  in  the  service  of  the  Church.  The  very 
sparing  literary  remains  which  we  meet  with  at  the 
beginning  of  the  Middle  High  German  period  are  filled 
with  a  disconsolate  asceticism  and  a  bitter  contempt  for 


14      BEGINNINGS  OF  MIDDLE  HIGH  GERMAN  POETRY. 

the  world.  This  spirit  is  to  be  seen  in  a  monkish  poem 
Memento  mori,  written  in  Alemannian  soon  after  the 
middle  of  the  eleventh  century,  and  in  a  still  more  acute 
form,  in  a  long  poetic  exposition  of  the  Nicene  Creed, 
Vom  Glauben,  composed  early  in  the  twelfth  century  by 
a  monk  of  Thuringia,  named  Hartmann.  A  less  negative 
aspect  of  the  Christianity  of  the  time  is  to  be  seen  in  the 
spirited  Ezzolied,  or  Lay  of  Ezzo  (1063),  which  was  written 
at  the  command  of  Bishop  Gunther  of  Bamberg.  The 
Ezzolied  goes  back  to  the  beginning  of  things,  and  de- 
scribes the  birth,  life,  and  death  of  Christ.  About  the 
same  time  Willeram,  abbot  of  Ebersberg  in  Bavaria,  para- 
phrased and  commented  in  prose  upon  the  Song  of 
Songs  (Das  hohe  Lied}.  A  lighter,  less  depressing  tone 
is  noticeable,  too,  in  poetic  versions  of  the  stories  of 
the  Old  Testament  (Genesis,  Exodus\  while  the  lyric 
feeling  of  the  time  found  almost  its  only  outlet  in  a 
number  of  Marienlieder,  in  which  the  worship  of  the 
Virgin  rises  at  times  to  extravagant  adoration ;  to  this 
category  belong  also  three  beautiful  Lieder  von  der 
Jungfrau  (ca.  1170)  by  a  priest,  Wernher,  who  was 
probably  a  Bavarian.  A  Frau  Ava  who  lived  in  Austria 
in  the  first  quarter  of  the  twelfth  century  has  left  several 
religious  poems;  and  a  little  later  (ca.  1160),  Heinrich 
von  Melk,  in  Austria,  mingled  asceticism  with  satire 
and  didacticism  in  his  Remembrance  of  Death  (Von 
des  todes  gehugede]  and  Priesterleben.  Mysticism,  the 
chief  undercurrent  in  the  spiritual  life  of  the  twelfth 
century,  has  left  its  traces  on  a  number  of  smaller 
German  poems,  such  as  Von  den  vier  Radern,  Anegenge 
("  beginning "),  and  the  so  -  called  Vorauer  Genesis  of 
about  the  year  1130. 

The  bridge  between  the  religious  and  secular  poetry 
of  the  twelfth  century  was  formed  by  a  large  number  of 
legends  of  the  saints,  of  which  the  earliest  is  the  so-called 
Annolied,  written  probably  before  the  end  of  the  eleventh 
century  by  a  clerical  poet  of  the  monastery  of  Siegburg 
near  Cologne.  Anno,  whose  life  and  death  the  poem 
celebrates,  was  a  famous  bishop  of  Cologne,  who  played 


LEGENDS;  " K^NIG  ROTHER."  15 

an  active  part  in  political  life ;  but  the  poem,  like  the 
Ezzolied,  goes  back  to  the  Creation,  and  describes  the 
spread  of  Christianity  down  to  the  founding  of  Cologne. 
Legends,  too,  form  a  considerable  part  of  the  Kaiser- 
chronik,  a  vast  poetic  chronicle  which  begins  with  the 
history  of  Rome  and  comes  down  to  the  middle  of 
the  twelfth  century.  This  work,  which  was  probably 
written  in  Regensburg  between  1130  and  1150,  was 
one  of  the  most  popular  books  of  the  Middle  Ages. 

So  far,  the  writing  of  poetry  had  lain  mainly  in  the 
hands  of  monks,  or  at  least  lay-brothers ;  but  now  with 
the  encroachments  of  the  secular  spirit  a  different  type 
of  poet  came  into  evidence  ;  this  was  the  "  Spielmann," 
whom  we  have  already  met  with  in  Old  High  German 
times,  but  whom  the  ascetic  religious  movement  had 
for  a  time  succeeded  in  silencing.  The  influence  of  the 
"  Spielleute "  is  to  be  traced  in  several  biblical  narrative 
poems  written  in  the  eleventh  and  early  twelfth  centuries  ; 
but  we  do  not  meet  with  undisguised  "  Spielmann's 
poetry "  until  the  middle  of  the  twelfth  century.  To  a 
wandering  singer  of  this  class  is  due  the  first  German 
epic  based  on  a  national  saga,  namely  Konig  Rother, 
which  was  probably  written  in  Bavaria  about  the  year 
1 1 60.  This  epic  is  an  excellent  example  of  the  light, 
sprightly  kind  of  narrative  intended  for  an  uncultured 
audience,  such  as  we  associate  with  the  Spielleute.  The 
unnamed  poet  is  not  concerned  with  finer  characterisa- 
tion or  psychological  probings;  he  is  content  to  tell  a 
story  that  will  interest  and  amuse  by  its  incidents  alone. 
King  Rother,  whose  seat  is  at  Bari  in  Italy,  chooses  as 
his  bride  the  daughter  of  a  king  of  Constantinople,  and 
the  sons  of  Duke  Berchter  of  Meran  are  sent  as  envoys 
to  demand  her  hand.  The  King  of  Constantinople,  how- 
ever, throws  the  envoys  into  prison,  and  Rother,  disguised 
as  a  Spielmann,  sets  out  to  free  them  and  to  win  his 
bride  himself.  He  succeeds  in  obtaining  an  interview 
with  the  princess  and  learns  that  she  will  wed  none 
but  King  Rother.  The  sons  of  Berchter  are  set  free, 
and  under  Rother's  leadership  they  do  the  King  of 


l6      BEGINNINGS  OF  MIDDLE  HIGH  GERMAN  POETRY. 

Constantinople  a  service  by  vanquishing  one  of  his 
enemies.  On  leaving  Constantinople  they  carry  off  the 
princess  in  their  ship.  An  obvious  continuation  of  the 
original  story  tells  how  the  latter  is  brought  back  to  her 
parents,  and  Rother  is  obliged  to  undergo  fresh  adventures 
to  win  her  again. 

The  influence  of  the  Crusades  on  Konig  Rother  is 
apparent  in  the  fact  that  the  hero  seeks  his  bride  in  the 
East;  that  influence  is  still  more  marked  on  a  second 
epic  of  this  period,  Herzog  Ernst  (ca.  1180).  This  poem 
is  based  on  the  popular  traditions  of  two  different  Dukes 
of  Swabia.  After  taking  vengeance  on  the  enemies  who 
have  calumniated  him,  Duke  Ernst  sets  out  on  a  crusade ; 
he  meets  with  the  most  extraordinary  adventures  in  the 
East,  finds  people  with  cranes'  heads  and  with  webbed  feet, 
pigmies,  giants,  and  all  kinds  of  natural  wonders.  As 
poetry,  Herzog  Ernst  is  lacking  in  the  personal  note  of  the 
Spielmann's  poetry,  which  makes  Konig  Rother  so  inter- 
esting ;  it  is  even  doubtful  if  it  was  written  by  a  Spielmann 
at  all.  On  the  other  hand,  poems  like  Salman  und  Morolf, 
Orendel,  and  Oswald,  in  each  of  which  the  theme  of  Konig 
Rother  recurs  in  a  more  or  less  modified  form,  may  be 
regarded  as  typical  specimens  of  the  Spielmann's  epic  at 
the  close  of  the  twelfth  century. 

The  Crusades  were  responsible  for  a  great  deal  more 
in  German  literature  than  the  oriental  scenery  of  Konig 
Rother  and  the  oriental  lore  of  romances  like  Herzog 
Ernst;  to  them  we  owe  the  social  type  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  the  knight  or  "  Ritter,"  in  whom  the  religious  and 
secular  ideals  of  the  time  were  blended  and  reconciled. 
This  type  was  restricted  to  no  one  land  or  nationality, 
and  consequently  created  a  basis  of  common  sympathy 
and  understanding  for  the  intellectual  life  of  all  Europe. 
The  idea  of  chivalry  developed,  however,  most  rapidly  in 
Provence,  and  from  there  the  literature  of  chivalry  spread 
to  other  lands.  This  new  spirit  is  to  be  seen  in  two 
German  epics  of  French  origin,  which  belong  to  a 
period  anterior  to  the  middle  of  the  twelfth  century,  the 
Alexander/ted  and  the  Rolandslied. 


"  ALEXANDERLIED  "    AND    "  ROLANDSLIED."       17 

The  life  of  Alexander  the  Great  had,  at  a  comparatively 
early  date,  been  made  the  subject  of  romance,  and  the 
hero's  adventures  in  the  unknown  East  gave  the  successive 
poets  who  described  them  an  opportunity  for  introducing, 
with  their  own  embellishments,  the  legendary  lore  which 
was  current  in  Europe  about  the  Orient.  Lamprecht,  a 
German  priest  of  the  Rhineland,  was  the  author  of  the 
oldest  German  version  ;  it  was  written  about  1130  and  is 
based  on  a  French  Chanson  d1  Alixandre.  After  con- 
quering Italy,  Sicily,  Asia,  and  Africa,  Alexander  reaches 
the  end  of  the  world,  where  the  heavens  are  seen  turning 
round  it  like  a  wheel  on  its  axle,  but  through  lack  of 
humility  he  fails  to  add  the  Garden  of  Paradise  to  his 
conquests.  A  gentler  lyric  beauty  appears  occasionally 
in  the  poem,  but,  on  the  whole,  it  is  adapted  to  appeal 
to  the  rough  spirit  of  adventure  which  inspired  the  early 
Crusades.  The  second  epic,  the  German  version  of  the 
Chanson  de  Roland,  was  the  work  of  a  priest,  Konrad 
of  Regensburg,  to  whom  the  Kaiserchronik  has  also  been 
ascribed,  and  was  written  about  the  year  1135  ;  but  the 
German  Rolandslied  is  less  able  to  do  justice  to  its  theme 
than  the  Alexanderlied,  and  is  dominated  throughout  by  a 
narrow  monastic  fanaticism. 

A  more  immediate  forerunner  of  the  courtly  epic  of 
the  thirteenth  century  than  either  Lamprecht  or  Konrad 
is  Eilhart  von  Oberge,  a  vassal  of  Heinrich  the  Lion ; 
about  the  year  1180  Eilhart  produced  the  earliest  German 
version  of  the  story  of  Tristan.  There  is  little  of  the 
literary  polish  which  we  associate  with  the  Arthurian 
epic  about  this  Tnstranf,  but  the  polite  standpoint  of 
chivalrous  society  is  maintained  throughout.  The  new 
social  ideals  were  rapidly  gaining  ground  in  the  literature 
of  the  time,  a  feature  which  is  also  evident  in  other  epic 
romances  of  the  time,  such  as  Floris  und  Blancheflur,  a 
story  in  which  love  plays  almost  as  large  a  role  as  in 
Tristan.  The  Beast  epic,  too,  which,  as  we  have  seen, 
had  appeared  in  Germany  with  the  Latin  Ecbasis  Captivi 
of  the  tenth  century,  took  more  definite  form  about  1150 
in  a  Latin  poem,  Isengrimus,  written  in  Ghent,  and  then 

B 


l8      BEGINNINGS  OF  MIDDLE  HIGH  GERMAN  POETRY. 

rapidly  developed  in  the  hands  of  French  poets,  as  the 
Roman  de  Renart.  The  earliest  German  epic  of  the  fox 
was  written  in  imitation  of  this  French  romance  about 
1 1 80  by  an  Alsatian  poet  who  called  himself  Heinrich 
der  Glichezare  ("the  dissembler"). 

No  less  fruitful  was  the  influence  of  the  Crusades  on 
the  development  of  the  German  lyric.  Lyric  poetry, 
in  which  the  German  national  spirit  has,  in  all  times, 
found  its  truest  expression,  is  but  sparingly  represented  in 
the  record  of  the  earlier  period,  partly  because  owing  to 
its  nature  it  more  readily  escaped  being  written  down 
than  the  longer  and  less  easily  remembered  narrative 
poems.  A  "  Liebesgruss  "  embedded  in  the  Latin  epic  of 
Ruodlieb,  and  the  so-called  Carmina  Biirana,  a  Bavarian 
collection  —  which  is  for  the  most  part  Latin  —  of  the 
songs  of  the  Goliards  or  wandering  scholars,  are  almost 
the  only  vestiges.  The  lyric  first  becomes  a  constant 
element  in  German  literature  with  the  rise  of  the 
Minnesang,  that  is  to  say,  a  form  of  poetry  analogous  to 
the  lyric  of  chivalry  cultivated  by  the  troubadours  of 
Southern  France.  To  the  group  of  German  singers  who 
form  what  has  been  called  the  "  springtime  of  the  Minne- 
sang" (ca.  1 1 60-80)  belong  an  Austrian  nobleman  who 
appears  as  the  "  Herr  von  Kiirenberg,"  Dietmar  von 
Aist,  also  an  Austrian,  the  Burggraf  von  Regensburg,  and 
Meinloh  von  Sevelingen.  The  lyrics  of  these  singers  are 
primitive  in  their  simplicity,  and  describe  simple  lyric 
scenes  and  situations  in  the  most  direct  language  and 
often  with  an  unconscious  touch  of  naive  pathos.  Kiiren- 
berg composed  in  a  form  of  strophe  similar  to  that  of  the 
Nibelungenlied,  while  Dietmar  von  Aist  has  given  us  the 
earliest  German  "  Tagelied,"  that  is  to  say,  a  poem  analog- 
ous to  the  Provencal  "  alba  "  or  French  "  aube,"  in  which 
two  lovers  are  warned  of  the  approach  of  dawn.  Even  at 
this  early  date  we  find  evidence  of  that  didacticism  and 
satire  which  were  to  form  so  important  a  constituent  of 
later  German  mediaeval  literature,  namely,  in  the  so-called 
"  Spruchdichtung,"  which  comprises  short,  one-strophe 
poems  in  a  reflective  .and  often  pessimistic  tone.  As 


EARLY    MINNESANG   AND    DRAMA.  IQ 

"  Spruchdichter  "  of  this  early  time  two  are  known  to  us, 
one  probably  called  Herger,  the  other  "  Der  Spervogel." 

In  the  slow  development  of  dramatic  literature  Germany 
forms  no  exception  to  the  rule  of  European  nations  ;  and 
the  course  of  that  development  shows  little  divergence 
from  the  general  norm.  The  modern  drama  was  evolved 
in  Germany  as  elsewhere  from  the  church  liturgy.  In  the 
tenth  century  the  Easter  and  Christmas  services  were 
invested  with  a  certain  dramatic  character ;  the  events 
celebrated  at  these  festivals  were  narrated  by  the  priests 
in  dialogue,  and  even  acted.  This  was  the  beginning  of 
the  Easter  and  Passion  plays.  Opportunity  for  a  more 
secular  development  was  afforded  by  the  representation  of 
the  events  of  Christ's  birth,  celebrated  at  Epiphany,  such, 
for  instance,  as  the  arrival  of  the  Wise  Men  of  the  East, 
the  Slaughter  of  the  Innocents,  and  the  Flight  into  Egypt. 
A  German  Dreikonigsspiel  in  Latin  verse  has  been  pre- 
served from  the  eleventh  century.  Another  step  in  the 
direction  of  secularisation  was  taken  when  the  stories  of 
the  Old  Testament  were  included  in  these  representations 
of  sacred  history.  As  the  church  drama  thus  became 
more  secular  and  elaborate,  it  was  performed  outside  the 
churches,  often  in  the  market  -  places ;  and  as  laymen 
were  gradually  drawn  into  the  performances,  Latin  had  to 
give  way  to  the  vernacular.  But  even  in  the  twelfth 
century  very  little  progress  had  been  made,  and  the  most 
interesting  plays  of  that  century — an  elaborate  work  pro- 
duced at  Regensburg  in  1194  which  represented  the 
creation  of  the  angels,  the  dethronement  of  Lucifer,  the 
creation  of  the  world  and  the  Fall,  and  a  Latin  Anti- 
christ play  from  the  monastery  of  Tegernsee  (1188), 
which  reflected  faintly  the  spirit  of  the  German  people 
in  the  days  of  Barbarossa  —  can  hardly  be  considered 
as  constituting  a  dramatic  literature.  For  the  real 
awakening  of  her  drama  Germany  had  to  wait  until 
the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century  and  the  in- 
fluence of  the  Reformation. 


20 


CHAPTER    III. 

THE    POPULAR    EPIC. 

THE  narrative  poetry  of  the  German  Middle  Ages  falls, 
according  to  the  subjects  of  which  it  treats,  into  two 
main  groups,  the  Popular  or  National  Epic  and  the  Court 
Epic.  In  the  present  chapter  we  have  to  deal  with  the 
first  of  these  types  of  epic  :  it  is  national  in  so  far  as  its 
themes  are  taken  from  German  history  and  tradition,  and 
popular  in  so  far  as  the  traditions  were  handed  down  by 
the  people  and  thrown  into  epic  form  by  "  Spielleute"  or 
popular  singers.  The  line  of  demarcation  between  the 
two  kinds  of  poetry  is,  however,  by  no  means  so  clear 
as  the  above  definition  might  imply,  and  many  of  the 
popular  epics  received  their  final  form  from  poets  who 
were  schooled  in  the  art  of  the  Court  epic. 

The  beginnings  of  the  German  national  epic  are,  as  we 
have  seen,  to  be  looked  for  in  the  stormy  history  of  the 
Migrations.  The  famous  deeds  of  the  kings  of  the 
Ostrogoths,  Ermanarich  and  Theodorich  the  Great,  who 
appears  in  the  sagas  as  Dietrich  von  Bern  (i.e.,  Verona), 
formed  the  nucleus  of  one  great  group  of  stories ;  epic 
materials  were  also  provided  by  the  annihilation  of  the 
Burgundians  and  their  king  Gundahari  by  the  Huns  in 
437,  an  event  which  made  a  deep  impression  on  the 
Germanic  imagination,  and  was  brought  into  connection 
with  the  tragic  end  of  Attila,  king  of  the  Huns,  in  453. 
An  important  group  of  sagas  which  gathered  round  the 
figure  of  Siegfried  of  Xanten,  seems  to  have  been  especi- 
ally developed  by  the  Frankish  tribes  on  the  Rhine ; 


THE   "  NIBELUNGENLIED."  <2l 

while,  standing  more  isolated,  a  number  of  stories  of  the  sea 
sprang  up  amongst  the  Low  German  peoples  of  the  coast. 
These  sagas  were  handed  down  through  the  centuries  by 
oral  tradition,  and  provided  the  materials  from  which 
the  unnamed  German  poets  of  the  close  of  the  twelfth 
and  beginning  of  the  thirteenth  centuries  wove  their  epics. 
By  far  the  most  important  of  these  is  Der  Nibelunge  Not 
or  Das  Nibelungenlied,  the  national  epic  of  the  German 
people,  which  was  composed  in  Austria,  probably  in  the 
last  decade  of  the  twelfth  century. 

The  theme  of  this  epic  is  the  result  of  a  fusion  between 
two  originally  quite  distinct  traditions,  the  Frankish  saga 
of  Siegfried,  who  wins  a  great  treasure  and  goes  through 
an  adventure  similar  to  that  which  is  familiar  to  us  from 
the  story  of  the  "sleeping  beauty,"  with  the  more  im- 
mediately historical  accounts  of  the  Burgundians.  This 
race  had  settled  on  the  Rhine  early  in  the  fifth  century, 
and  owing  to  the  fertile  character  of  their  territory,  they 
were  associated  with  an  older  mythical  saga  of  a  treasure 
or  "  hoard  "  which  lay  sunk  in  the  Rhine  ;  it  was  this  same 
treasure  which  Siegfried  had  once  wrested  from  its  original 
possessors,  the  Nibelungs  or  children  of  darkness,  and  to 
the  Burgundians  the  name  Nibelung  is  transferred.  At 
Worms,  on  the  Rhine,  King  Gunther  holds  his  court ; 
here  live,  too,  his  mother  Ute,  his  sister  Kriemhild,  and 
two  brothers  Gernot  and  Giselher.  Of  the  many  faithful 
vassals  of  the  king,  Hagen  von  Tronege  occupies  the  first 
place.  The  tragedy  of  the  epic  is  foreshadowed  by  a 
dream  of  Kriemhild's  at  the  opening  of  the  poem  :  she 
sees  a  wild  falcon  which  she  had  tamed,  torn  by  two 
eagles.  The  falcon,  her  mother  tells  her,  is  a  husband ; 
whereupon  she  will  hear  nothing  of  marriage.  But  it 
happens  otherwise.  Siegfried,  son  of  a  king  of  the  Nether- 
lands, arrives  as  a  stranger  at  Worms,  where  only  Hagen 
recognises  in  him  the  hero  who  slew  the  dragon  and 
bathed  himself  invulnerable  in  its  blood.  Kriemhild  and 
Siegfried  find  favour  in  each  other's  eyes.  Meanwhile 
Siegfried  not  'only  assists  Gunther  against  his  enemies, 
but  is  persuaded  to  help  the  Burgundian  king  to  win 


22  THE   POPULAR   EPIC. 

as  his  bride  a  princess  of  Iceland,  Brunhild.  At  this 
point  we  seem  to  come  upon  an  older  stratum  of  the 
poem,  which  becomes  clearer  when  we  turn  to  the 
Scandinavian  version.  According  to  the  latter,  this 
Brunhild  was  originally  a  Valkyrie,  a  daughter  of  Wodan 
himself;  and  although  the  German  poet  of  the  twelfth 
century  seems  ignorant  of  this,  he  retains  the  super- 
human elements  in  Brunhild's  character,  especially  her 
enormous  physical  strength.  The  hero  who  would  win 
her  must  overcome  her  in  three  tests  of  bodily  prowess, 
in  throwing  the  spear,  in  hurling  the  stone,  and  in  leap- 
ing ;  otherwise  he  must  pay  the  penalty  of  his  temerity 
with  his  life.  Gunther,  himself  unable  to  stand  these 
tests,  is  assisted  by  Siegfried,  who,  by  means  of  his 
"  tarnkappe,"  or  mantle  of  invisibility,  stands  at  his 
friend's  side  during  the  contest.  Brunhild  is  overcome 
and  returns  with  the  Burgundians  across  the  sea  to 
Worms,  where  a  double  marriage  is  celebrated  :  Gunther 
and  Brunhild,  Siegfried  and  Kriemhild.  But  Brunhild, 
as  we  know  from  the  northern  version,  and  as  the  German 
poet  apparently  did  not  know,  had  once  been  rescued  by 
no  other  than  Siegfried  himself  from  the  fire  which  her 
angry  father,  Wodan,  had  raised  round  her  for  protect- 
ing, in  disobedience  to  his  commands,  the  race  of  the 
Volsungs,  and  she  is  far  from  contented  as  Gunther's 
queen.  She  envies  Kriemhild  her  husband,  and  re- 
proaches Gunther  for  having  without  reason  given  his 
sister  to  a  mere  bondsman.  And  once  more,  before 
the  marriage  has  been  consummated,  Siegfried  is  obliged 
to  aid  Gunther  in  overcoming  Brunhild's  supernatural 
strength. 

After  the  lapse  of  ten  years,  Kriemhild  and  Siegfried, 
who  has  in  the  meantime  succeeded  to  the  throne  of 
the  Netherlands,  return  to  Worms.  The  years  have  not 
cooled  Brunhild's  resentment,  and  it  breaks  out  afresh 
in  a  quarrel  with  Kriemhild  as  to  the  worth  of  their  re- 
spective husbands  ;  in  a  stormy  scene  before  the  minster, 
Kriemhild  in  blind  rage  calls  Brunhild  Siegfried's  mistress, 
and  as  proof  shows  her  the  ring  and  the  girdle  which 


SIEGFRIED'S  DEATH.  23 

Siegfried  had  wrested  from  her.  Siegfried's  denial  brings 
no  conviction  to  the  angry  Brunhild,  and  she  listens 
willingly  to  Hagen's  councils  :  Siegfried,  as  a  traitor  to 
his  king,  must  die. 

A  plot  is  schemed  by  Hagen.  He  causes  false 
messengers  to  arrive  with  a  declaration  of  war  against 
Gunther,  whereupon  Siegfried  offers  his  services  against 
the  enemy.  Kriemhild  blindly  entrusts  her  husband  to 
Hagen's  care,  and  in  order  that  he  may  know  how  to 
protect  him  in  case  of  need,  she  sews  with  her  own  hand 
a  cross  upon  his  coat  on  the  spot  where  the  leaf  fell  when 
he  bathed  himself  in  the  dragon's  blood,  the  only  spot 
where  he  is  vulnerable.  This  information  is  sufficient 
for  Hagen ;  the  rumours  of  war  are  contradicted,  and  a 
hunt  proposed  instead.  The  description  of  this  hunt 
in  the  forest  of  the  Vosges,  or  according  to  another 
version,  in  the  Odenwald,  is  fresh  and  vivid  ;  and  the 
events  of  the  day,  including  Siegfried's  capture  of  a 
bear,  are  dwelt  on  with  that  ironic  objectivity  which,  as 
we  have  seen,  was  characteristic  of  the  Spielmann's  art. 
Meanwhile  midday  has  arrived,  but  there  is  no  wine  for 
the  midday  meal.  Hagen,  however,  knows  a  spring  in 
the  neighhourhood  and  proposes  to  race  to  it ;  Siegfried 
is  the  first  to  reach  it,  but  he  will  not  drink  before  the 
king  ;  then,  as  he  bends  down  to  the  water,  Hagen  plunges 
Siegfried's  own  spear  into  the  vulnerable  spot  on  his  back. 
With  no  arms  at  hand  but  his  shield,  Siegfried  is  helpless, 
but  before  the  blow  of  the  shield  Hagen  flees,  as  he 
had  never  fled  before.  So  Siegfried's  life-blood  ebbs 
away,  and  at  night  the  body  is  carried  home  and,  by 
Hagen's  order,  laid  before  Kriemhild's  door.  In  the 
morning,  even  before  she  had  seen  the  body,  Kriemhild 
has  a  presentiment  that  her  husband  has  been  murdered, 
and  with  heartrending  shrieks  vows  revenge  upon  his  mur- 
derer. And  when  the  body  is  laid  out  in  the  minster,  the 
wound  bleeds  again  at  Hagen's  approach,  showing  him 
to  have  done  the  deed.  Kriemhild  remains  in  Worms, 
whither  she  has  had  the  Nibelung's  hoard  brought ;  but 
the  far-seeing  Hagen,  fearful  lest  this  wealth  might  give 


24  THE    POPULAR   EPIC. 

her  undue  power,  has  the  treasure  sunk  in  the  Rhine. 
Thus  the  first  part  of  the  tragedy  closes  with  an  echo  of 
one  of  the  very  oldest  motives  in  the  saga,  that  of  the 
Nibelung's  gold. 

Thirteen  years  pass  away,  and  Kriemhild  marries  again. 
Her  second  husband  is  the  powerful  King  Etzel  or  Attila 
of  Hunnenland.  She  has  only  married  him  on  the  con- 
dition that  he  will  obtain  for  her  amends  for  the  wrongs 
that  have  been  done  her.  Another  thirteen  years  pass 
away,  and  still  the  thought  of  vengeance  is  present  to  her. 
At  last  the  time  seems  ripe  to  put  it  in  execution.  At  her 
request  King  Etzel  invites  her  kinsfolk  to  a  great  festival ; 
two  Spielleute  are  sent  to  Burgundy  with  special  instruc- 
tions to  see  that,  if  the  invitation  is  accepted,  Hagen  at 
least  does  not  remain  behind.  Despite  Hagen's  warnings, 
the  Burgundians,  or,  as  the  poet  now  calls  them,  the 
Nibelungs,  set  out  on  their  journey  to  Etzel's  kingdom. 
When  they  reach  the  Danube,  two  water-sprites  prophesy 
to  Hagen  that  of  all  his  brave  company  none  but  the 
chaplain  will  ever  see  his  home  again.  As  they  are  being 
ferried  across  the  river,  Hagen  determines  to  make  the 
prophecy  naught  in  at  least  one  particular,  by  throwing 
the  chaplain  into  the  river ;  but  the  latter  swims  to  the 
shore,  and  Hagen  realises  grimly  that  nothing  can  now 
avert  the  fate  that  awaits  them.  They  are  entertained 
on  the  way  by  the  Markgraf  Riidiger,  and  warned  by 
Dietrich  of  Bern,  who  rides  out  to  meet  them.  Etzel 
has  made  hospitable  preparations  for  his  visitors,  but 
Kriemhild  receives  them  coldly ;  only  for  her  youngest 
brother  Giselher  has  she  a  kiss.  In  defiant  hatred  she 
demands  of  Hagen  why  he  has  not  brought  with  him  her 
treasure.  The  Nibelungs  refuse  to  divest  themselves  of 
their  arms ;  Hagen  admits  that  he  was  Siegfried's  mur- 
derer, and  that  it  is  Siegfried's  sword  he  wears  by  his 
side.  The  guests  retire  to  rest  in  a  hall,  where  Hagen 
and  the  Spielmann  Volker  of  Alzei  keep  watch  and  prevent 
the  night  attack  which  the  Huns  had  planned.  Next  day 
at  a  tournament  a  noble  Hun  is  slain  by  Volker,  and 
this  is  the  signal  for  an  open  feud.  At  Kriemhild's  wish, 


KRIEMHILD'S  REVENGE.  25 

her  brother-in-law  Blodelin  treacherously  attacks  a  body 
of  the  Nibelungs,  and  in  retaliation  Hagen  strikes  off  the 
head  of  Kriemhild's  son,  Ortlieb.  The  struggle  now 
becomes  general,  and  only  by  Dietrich's  intercession  is 
it  possible  for  Etzel,  Kriemhild,  and  some  six  hundred 
men  to  leave  the  hall.  In  the  night  Kriemhild  commands 
the  hall  to  be  set  on  fire,  and  when  morning  dawns  the 
survivors  of  the  terrible  ordeal  are  once  more  attacked  by 
the  avenging  Huns ;  one  after  the  other  the  leaders  of 
the  Nibelungs  fall,  until  only  Gunther  and  Hagen  are 
left ;  these  are  overcome  and  made  prisoners  by  Dietrich. 
They  are  brought  before  the  queen,  who  once  more  de- 
mands of  Hagen  her  treasure,  but  he  refuses  to  reveal 
where  it  is  concealed  as  long  as  any  of  his  masters  live, 
whereupon  Kriemhild  orders  her  brother  to  be  beheaded 
and  the  head  brought  to  Hagen.  But  still  he  will  not 
tell,  and  with  her  own  hand  Kriemhild  draws  from  his 
side  Siegfried's  sword  and  strikes  off  his  head.  Then 
Dietrich's  vassal  Hildebrand  avenges  Hagen's  shameful 
death  by  slaying  Kriemhild. 

The  origin  of  the  Nibdungenlied  is  still  a  very  vexed 
question.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  the  poem,  as  we  know 
it,  was  probably  preceded  by  a  Rhenish  epic  of  the 
twelfth  century,  perhaps  even  by  a  still  older  Latin  poem 
on  the  subject.  The  strength  of  the  Nibelungenlied  lies, 
above  all  things,  in  its  unity  of  construction ;  it  is  based 
on  one  fundamental  and  primitive  idea,  which  is  ex- 
pressed in  the  opening  of  the  poem  and  recurs  again 
at  the  close,  the  idea  that  human  happiness  must  be 
paid  for  in  the  end  by  suffering ;  "  nach  liebe  leit,"  the 
inevitable  retribution  that  follows  on  excess  of  earthly 
joy.  This  is  the  ethical  idea  in  the  background  of  the 
whole ;  and  the  motives  which  actuate  the  characters  are 
unflinching  loyalty  of  man  to  master  on  the  one  side, 
and  on  the  other  an  unswerving  desire  for  vengeance, 
with  which  is  associated  the  baser  motive  of  the  greed 
for  gold.  The  literary  qualities  of  this  national  epic  are 
rather  rugged  strength  and  unveiled  directness  than  poetic 
subtlety  or  intellectual  grace ;  the  poem  is  essentially 


26  THE    POPULAR   EPIC. 

Germanic,  the  Christian  and  chivalric  element  being 
but  a  superficial  veneer  added  at  a  later  period.  At  the 
same  time,  the  Nibelungenlied  is  neither  uncouth  nor 
barbaric,  nor  is  it  lacking  in  scenes  of  gentler  beauty  and 
humour ;  but  its  beauty  is  primitive  in  its  simplicity,  and  its 
humour  grim  in  its  subtle  irony.  A  later  poet  attempted 
to  carry  the  story  beyond  the  culminating  catastrophe  in 
Die  Klage,  a  poem  of  much  inferior  merit,  in  which  the 
survivors  mourn  for  the  fallen  heroes ;  but  this  poem  has 
little  of  the  heroism  of  the  great  age,  and  was  evidently 
composed  merely  to  satisfy  the  popular  craving  for  a 
continuation. 

The  Nibelungenlied  has  been  called  the  Iliad  of  the 
Germanic  peoples ;  in  a  similar  way,  the  second  of  the 
great  national  epics,  Gudrun,  might  be  compared  with  the 
Odyssey.  The  two  poems  present  similar  points  of  con- 
trast to  the  Greek  epics  :  the  Nibelungenlied  is  a  lurid 
tragedy  of  revenge,  full  of  wild  passions  and  fierce 
slaughters,  involving  the  fates  of  whole  peoples ;  Gudrun, 
or  Kudrun,  is  an  epic  of  the  sea,  a  story  of  adventure  and 
of  loyal  affection,  rewarded  in  the  end ;  it  centres,  not  in 
a  nation,  but  in  an  individual  heroine.  The  inequality 
between  the  Nibelungenlied  and  Gudrun  is,  however, 
greater  than  that  between  Iliad  and  Odyssey ;  the  second 
epic  is  more  dependent  upon  the  first,  and  is  further 
removed  from  the  original  primitive  basis.  The  broad 
lines  of  the  Nibelungenlied  are  lacking  in  Gudrun ;  its 
construction  is  loose  and  uncertain,  being  dependent  more 
on  fortuitous  accretions  from  without,  on  repetitions  of 
motives  and  episodes,  than  on  the  natural  development 
of  a  carefully  moulded  plan.  On  the  other  hand,  Gudrun 
has  the  advantage  of  a  milder,  gentler  conception  of 
life ;  the  spirit  of  Christianity  has  sunk  deeper  into  it, 
and  the  graces  of  chivalric  ideals  make  its  characters, 
above  all  that  of  the  heroine  herself,  more  human  and 
lovable.  In  its  original  form,  Gudrun  was  an  epic  of  the 
Germanic  tribes  dwelling  on  the  North  Sea  coasts ;  it  be- 
longed to  the  same  cycle  of  sagas  which  includes  the  Old 
English  Beowulf.  But  of  this  original  form  nothing  has 


"GUDRUN."  27 

come  down  to  us,  and  we  are  entirely  dependent  for  our 
knowledge  of  the  poem  on  an  Austrian  version  written 
probably  between  1210  and  1215. 

The  epic  of  Gudnm  falls  into  two  more  or  less  parallel 
halves,  the  first  of  which  relates  the  story  of  Gudrun's 
mother,  Hilde,  the  second  of  Gudrun  herself.  More  than 
this,  the  first  four  cantos  or  "  Aventiuren  "  of  the  poem 
tell  the  story  of  Gudrun's  grandfather,  Hagen,  who  as  a 
child  had  been  carried  off  to  a  lonely  island  by  a  griffin, 
and  had  there  found  three  beautiful  princesses,  one  of 
whom,  Hilde  of  India,  becomes  his  wife.  Their  daughter, 
likewise  called  Hilde,  is  protected  by  her  jealous  father 
from  all  wooers,  until  she  is  ultimately  won  by  a  Scan- 
dinavian king,  Hettel,  who  employs  ingenious  ruses.  With 
three  of  his  vassals,  the  sweet  singer  Horand,  the  generous 
Frute,  and  the  grim  Wate,  he  sets  out  disguised  as  a 
merchant  to  Hagen's  home  in  Ireland,  and  Horand's 
singing  wins  him  a  private  audience  with  Hilde ;  he 
presses  his  master's  suit,  and  finds  no  unwilling  ear. 
The  court  is  invited  to  inspect  the  wares  which  the 
strangers  have  on  board  their  ships ;  as  soon  as  Hilde 
and  her  retinue  are  safely  on  board  one  of  the  ships, 
the  men  of  the  party  are  thrown  overboard  and  Hettel 
makes  good  his  flight,  leaving  Hilde's  father  in  help- 
less wrath  on  the  shore.  But  Hagen  gives  chase,  and 
overtakes  the  fugitives  as  they  reach  Scandinavia.  A  fierce 
battle  takes  place  on  the  shore,  in  which  both  kings  are 
wounded  before  Hilde  succeeds  in  interceding  as  peace- 
maker. Hettel  and  Hilde  have  a  son,  Orwin,  and  a 
daughter,  Gudrun,  the  latter  even  more  beautiful  than 
her  mother.  Gudrun  is  guarded  no  less  carefully  by  her 
father  than  Hilde  had  been  guarded  by  Hagen,  but  King 
Herwig  of  Seeland  has  won  her  heart,  and  after  a  similar 
battle  with  Gudrun's  father  she  is  betrothed  to  Herwig. 
Here,  however,  the  parallelism  of  the  stories  ends.  A 
disappointed  suitor  of  Gudrun,  Siegfried  of  Morland,  now 
makes  war  on  King  Herwig,  and  Hettel  goes  to  the 
latter's  assistance,  leaving  his  own  land  unprotected. 
This  is  the  opportunity  for  a  third  suitor,  Hartmut, 


28  THE   POPULAR   EPIC. 

who,  with  his  father,  King  Ludwig  of  Ormandie,  or  Nor- 
mandy, sweeps  down  on  Hettel's.  land  and  carries  off 
Gudrun  and  her  maidens.  Hettel  gives  chase,  but  in  a 
terrible  battle  on  the  island  of  Wiilpensand,  off  the  Dutch 
coast,  he  is  defeated  and  slain  by  King  Ludwig. 

Gudrun  is  brought  by  her  captors  to  Normandy,  but 
she  refuses  to  become  Hartmut's  wife,  and  is  treated  with 
great  cruelty,  being  condemned  to  the  most  menial  of 
tasks.  Years  pass  and  her  lot  becomes  harder  and 
harder;  for  five  years  and  a  half,  even  in  the  depth 
of  winter,  she  is  compelled  to  kneel  by  the  sea  day  after 
day  washing  clothes.  Thirteen  years  have  now  elapsed 
since  the  battle  on  the  Wiilpensand,  and  Hettel's  people, 
the  Hegelingen,  feel  themselves  strong  enough  to  avenge 
themselves  on  the  Normans ;  they  set  out  for  Normandy, 
and  an  angel  in  the  form  of  a  bird  brings  Gudrun  tidings 
of  her  coming  rescue.  Next  morning  as  she  and  her 
faithful  maid,  Hildburg,  are  washing  barefoot  in  the  snow, 
a  boat  approaches  with  two  men  in  it ;  they  are  Gudrun's 
brother,  Ortwin,  and  her  betrothed,  Herwig.  First,  Gudrun 
tells  them  that  the  Gudrun  whom  they  seek  is  long  dead, 
whereupon  the  men  burst  into  tears ;  but  the  rings  she 
and  Herwig  had  exchanged  lead  to  a  recognition.  Next 
morning  the  Hegelingen  attack  the  castle,  a  fearful 
slaughter  ensues,  no  less  sanguinary  than  that  at  the 
close  of  the  Nibelungenlied.  The  poem,  however,  does 
not  close  so  tragically,  for  Gudrun  is  united  to  Herwig, 
her  brother  marries  the  Norman  princess  Ortrun,  and  the 
young  king  of  Normandy — his  father  and  mother  have 
been  both  slain — marries  the  faithful  Hildburg. 

Besides  the  two  great  epics  there  is  a  large  body  of 
popular  epic  romance  of  varying  poetic  value,  ranging 
from  the  crudest  Spielmann's  epics  to  poems  hardly  dis- 
tinguishable, except  by  their  theme,  from  the  Court  epics. 
It  is  usual  to  group  these  popular  epics  together  under 
the  collective  title  of  Das  Heldenbuch.  The  connecting 
link  in  these  romances  is  the  figure  of  Theodorich  the 
Great,  or,  as  he  is  known  to  poetry,  Dietrich  von  Bern. 
In  most  of  them  he  is  the  central  figure,  or  at  least 


THE    "  HELDENBUCH.  '  2Q 

stands  to  them  in  a  relation  similar  to  that  in  which 
King  Arthur  stands  to  the  knights  whose  adventures  are 
related  in  the  Court  epic.  But  in  a  higher  degree  than 
Arthur  or  Charles  the  Great,  higher  even  than  Siegfried, 
Dietrich  was  the  national  German  ideal  of  a  hero ;  even 
in  the  Nibelungenlied  itself  we  find  an  echo  of  this  senti- 
ment ;  brave  and  strong  as  Siegfried  is,  Dietrich  is 
surrounded  by  a  mysterious  halo  of  reverence  as  the 
incorporation  of  all  Siegfried's  virtues,  and  of  supreme 
wisdom  as  well ;  he  is  the  ideal  of  the  wise,  strong  man. 
In  one  of  the  epics  of  this  cycle,  Der  Rosengarten,  for 
instance,  which  describes  the  various  conflicts  that  took 
place  round  Kriemhild's  "rose-garden"  at  Worms,  even 
Siegfried  is  obliged  to  flee  before  Dietrich  and  seek  pro- 
tection with  Kriemhild.  Siegfried  and  Dietrich  appear 
again  as  opposing  combatants  in  the  epic  of  Biterolf  und 
Dietlieb,  written  in  Austria  at  the  beginning  of  the  thirteenth 
century,  a  poem  in  which  the  influence  of  the  Court  poetry 
is  strong. 

In  a  number  of  these  romances  the  folklore  of  super- 
natural adventure,  so  beloved  by  the  popular  Spielmann, 
plays  a  large  role;  dwarfs  and  giants  are  the  enemies 
against  whom  these  heroes  have  to  prove  their  mettle. 
This  is  seen  in  the  charming  story  of  Laurin,  oder  der 
kleine  Rosengarten,  in  which  the  rose-garden  of  Worms  is 
transferred  to  Tyrol ;  its  boundaries  here  are  only  marked 
off  by  a  silken  thread,  and  it  is  watched  over  by  a  dwarf 
Laurin.  Every  intruder  is  condemned  to  lose  his  right 
foot  and  his  left  hand.  Dietrich  and  Witege  undertake 
to  punish  the  dwarf;  and  they  compel  him  to  open  up 
his  subterranean  kingdom.  The  cunning  Laurin,  however, 
again  gets  them  into  his  power  by  means  of  a  sleeping- 
draught,  and  another  chain  of  adventures  has  to  be  gone 
through  before  he  is  finally  overcome.  But  giants  are 
the  favourite  embodiments  of  evil  in  these  stories,  as  in 
Das  Eckenlied,  which  is  written  in  strophes  of  thirteen 
lines  each,  Sigenot,  Goldemar,  and  Virginal. 

For  poetic  beauty  and  strength  the  first  place  among 
the  poems  of  the  Dietrich  cycle  belongs  to  the  fragmentary 


30  THE    POPULAR   EPIC. 

epic  of  Alpharts  Tod.  In  this  story  of  a  brave  young 
hero  who  goes  out  to  fight  against  uneven  odds,  and 
ultimately  falls  at  the  hand  of  Witege  whose  life  he  had 
spared,  we  alone  find  something  of  that  tragic  singleness 
of  purpose  and  epic  dignity  which  are  characteristic  of  the 
Nibelungenlied.  The  last  two  epics  of  the  cycle,  Dietrichs 
Flucht  and  Die  Rabenschlacht  (i.e.,  "battle  of  Ravenna"), 
belong  by  the  nature  of  their  themes  to  the  main  con- 
stituents of  what,  under  more  favourable  circumstances, 
might  have  been  a  national  epic  with  Dietrich  as  central 
figure;  but  unfortunately  they  were  both  written  at  the 
close  of  the  thirteenth  century,  long  after  the  best  epoch 
of  the  popular  epic  was  past.  In  the  foreground  of  the 
action  stands  Dietrich's  feud  with  Ermanarich,  the  treason 
of  his  own  vassals,  Witege  and  Heime,  and  the  alliance  of 
Dietrich  with  the  King  of  the  Huns,  Etzel.  But  the 
innate  nobility  of  the  old  epic  has  disappeared ;  the 
interest  is  eked  out  with  supernatural  motives  borrowed 
from  the  lower  Spielmann's  poetry,  and  the  style  is  diffuse 
and  wanting  in  distinction. 

Not  all  the  stories  of  the  Heldenbuch^  however,  belong 
to  the  Dietrich  saga  in  its  narrower  sense.  Ortnit  and 
Wolfdietrich — the  latter  a  long,  confused  epic  which  has 
been  preserved  in  several  versions  —  are  characteristic 
Spielmann's  epics,  which  have  but  a  remote  connection 
with  the  other  poems  of  the  collection.  Ortnit  is  the 
familiar  story  of  a  king — he  is  here  king  of  Lamparten 
or  Lombardy — who  seeks  his  bride  in  foreign  lands  and 
carries  her  off  by  stealth.  His  father-in-law  takes  revenge 
by  sending  a  brood  of  young  dragons  into  Ortnit's  land, 
one  of  which  kills  him.  Connected  with  this  story  is 
that  of  Wolfdietrich,  who  at  the  close  of  the  former  poem 
came  to  the  court  of  Ortnit  and  successfully  vanquished 
the  dragons.  Wolfdietrich  is  the  son  of  King  Hugdietrich 
of  Constantinople,  and  as  a  child  he  shows  such  amazing 
strength  that  the  king  believes  the  devil  and  not  himself 
must  be  the  real  father.  He  consequently  entrusts  his 
faithful  vassal,  Duke  Berchtung,  with  the  task  of  killing 
the  child.  Berchtung  has  not  the  heart  to  carry  out 


"ORTNIT"  AND  "  WOLFDIETRICH.  '  31 

his  master's  commands,  but  leaves  Wolfdietrich  beside  a 
pool  of  water  in  the  hope  that  he  will  try  to  pluck  the 
water-lilies  and  fall  in  and  be  drowned.  But  this  does 
not  happen,  and  at  night  when  the  beasts  of  the  forest 
come  down  to  the  pool  to  drink  they  leave  the  child 
unmolested,  a  group  of  wolves  even  sitting  round  him 
watching  him  in  the  moonlight.  Next  day  Berchtung 
gives  the  child  to  a  peasant  to  bring  up,  and  the  father 
subsequently  repents.  Hugdietrich  has,  however,  already 
divided  his  kingdom  among  his  other  sons,  and  Wolf- 
dietrich goes  empty  -  handed ;  a  feud  arises  with  the 
brothers,  in  which  Wolfdietrich's  whole  army  is  anni- 
hilated except  the  faithful  Berchtung,  his  ten  sons,  and 
Wolfdietrich  himself.  It  is  at  this  point  in  the  story  that 
he  escapes  to  Lombardy.  In  a  subsequent  series  of  ad- 
ventures he  rescues  Berchtung's  sons,  who  are  prisoners 
in  Constantinople,  and  avenges  himself  on  his  enemies. 

These  are,  in  brief  summary,  the  sagas  which  make 
up  the  national  epic  of  the  German  people;  they  go 
far  back,  as  we  have  seen,  into  German  history,  back 
to  the  age  of  the  Migrations,  and  even  beyond  it ;  for 
there  is  possibly  a  dim,  unconscious  echo  in  them  of  a 
still  earlier  and  more  primitive  poetry,  in  which  the  forces 
of  nature,  the  seeming  victory  of  light  over  darkness,  of 
sunshine  over  storm,  of  summer  over  winter,  are  reflected. 
This  epic  literature,  moreover,  was  not  merely  a  pos- 
session of  the  Middle  Ages,  but  was  revived  again  in 
succeeding  epochs,  in  the  prose  romances  and  ballads 
of  the  period  before  and  after  the  Reformation,  in  the 
eighteenth  century  as  soon  as  the  fetters  of  classicism 
had  been  broken,  and  in  the  drama  of  the  nineteenth 
century  from  La  Motte  Fouque  to  Hebbel  and  Wagner. 


CHAPTER    IV. 

THE    COURT    EPIC. 

THE  second  of  the  two  main  divisions  into  which  the 
narrative  poetry  of  the  Middle  Ages  falls  is  the  Court 
Epic.  It  is  distinguished  from  the  Popular  Epic,  which 
has  just  been  discussed,  not  so  much  by  an  essential 
difference  of  treatment,  of  poet,  or  even  of  the  public  to 
which  it  appealed,  as  by  a  difference  in  the  materials  of 
which  it  was  composed.  The  themes  of  the  Court  Epic 
are  mainly  taken  from  the  vast  body  of  story  and  tradition 
that  grew  up  round  the  figure  of  King  Arthur  and  the 
knights  of  his  Round  Table  ;  these  stories  were  seized 
upon  by  French  poets,  who  made  them  a  kind  of  mirror 
of  the  polite  life  of  the  twelfth  century,  and  from  France 
they  were  imported  into  Germany.  The  civilisation  they 
describe  was  wholly  different  from  that  of  the  national 
sagas ;  and  their  conventions  and  customs  were  originally 
as  foreign  to  Germany  as  their  themes.  It  is  true,  the 
point  of  view,  even  in  the  earliest  attempts  to  naturalise 
the  French  epic,  was,  to  the  best  of  the  adapter's  ability, 
focussed  to  German  eyes ;  but,  as  a  rule,  the  German 
poets  of  the  Court  Epic  did  not  allow  themselves  much 
freedom  of  invention,  and  consequently  a  good  deal 
besides  the  mere  incidents  of  the  story  was  taken  over 
from  the  French  poems.  It  is  this  which  makes  these 
adaptations  often  appear  exotic  when  compared  with  the 
epics  on  national  themes. 

We  have  already  seen  how  a  courtly  type  of  epic  had 
begun  to  differentiate  itself  from  the  older  German  narra- 


HEINRICH    VON    VELDEKE.  33 

tive  literature,  in  the  poems  of  Lamprecht,  Konrad,  and, 
most  noticeable  of  all,  in  the  Tristrant  of  Eilhart  von 
Oberge.  But  the  real  founder  of  the  Court  Epic  in 
Germany  was  Heinrich  von  Veldeke,  a  poet  whose  home 
was  at  Maestricht  in  the  Low  Lands.  His  earliest  poem 
seems  to  have  been  a  translation  of  the  legend  of  Saint 
Servatius ;  he  then  began,  about  the  year  1175,  to  pre- 
pare a  German  version  of  the  French  Roman  d' Eneas  ; 
but  this  was  not  finished  until  about  1186.  Heinrich 
von  Veldeke's  Emit  is  the  first  German  Court  Epic  of  im- 
portance. The  main  features  of  this  translation  of  Virgil 
into  terms  of  the  Middle  Ages — especially  the  quite  un- 
classic  adaptation  of  the  love  episodes  to  suit  the  ideals 
of  the  age  of  chivalry — are  naturally  also  to  be  found  in 
the  French  original ;  but  Heinrich  von  Veldeke  is  not  a 
literal  translator,  and  the  alterations  which  he  makes,  do 
not  always  seem  to  be  due  to  exigencies  of  metre  or 
rhyme  ;  he  thinks  the  French  poet's  thoughts  over  again, 
and  in  an  essentially  German  way.  His  poem  is  thus 
German  in  something  more  than  its  language.  A  little 
later  than  Heinrich  von  Veldeke,  and  obviously  inspired 
by  him,  a  Hessian  poet,  Herbert  von  Fritslar,  prepared, 
under  the  patronage  of  the  Landgraf  Hermann  of  Thur- 
ingia,  a  counterpart  to  the  Eneit  by  translating  Benoit 
de  Sainte  More's  epic  of  the  Trojan  War ;  but  Herbert's 
Lied  von  Troja  shows  much  less  skill  and  originality  than 
its  predecessor,  and  is,  in  its  enormous  length  —  over 
18,000  verses  —  tedious  and  unreadable.  Hardly  more 
merit  is  to  be  found  in  Albrecht  von  Halberstadt's 
version  of  Ovid's  Metamorphoses  (ca.  1190),  which  was 
based  on  the  Latin  original  and  not  on  a  French  trans- 
lation ;  but  only  a  fragment  of  the  original  poem  has  come 
down  to  us. 

Although  the  beginnings  of  the  Court  Epic  are  thus  to 
be  sought  on  the  Lower  Rhine,  the  three  chief  masters, 
Hartmann  von  Aue,  Wolfram  von  Eschenbach,  and 
Gottfried  von  Strassburg,  were  all  South  Germans.  It 
was  the  special  merit  of  the  first  of  these,  Hartmann  von 
Aue,  to  give  Germany  a  Court  Epic  on  the  model  of  the 

c 


34  THE    COURT    EPIC. 

French  Arthurian  epics  of  Chretien  de  Troyes.  Of 
Hartmann's  life,  as  of  the  lives  of  all  the  poets  of  this  time, 
we  have  only  fragmentary,  indirect,  and  uncertain  know- 
ledge. He  seems  to  have  been  born  about  1170,  and 
served  as  "  dienstman "  or  vassal  of  a  lord  of  Aue, 
probably  in  the  Ortenau  on  the  west  side  of  the  Black 
Forest ;  he  had  the  advantage  of  a  scholarly  education, 
and  his  life  was  darkened  by  more  than  one  sorrow.  He 
perhaps  took  part  in  the  unfortunate  Crusade  of  1196-97, 
and  he  was  dead  before  1220.  To  his  earlier  years  belong 
his  lyrics  and  the  Biichlein  or  Klage,  a  love  epistle  in 
the  manner  of  the  old  "  Soul  and  Body "  dialogues  of 
mediaeval  literature.  His  principal  romances  were  written 
in  the  last  decade  of  the  twelfth  and  the  first  decade  of 
the  thirteenth  century  ;  they  are,  in  the  most  probable 
chronological  order,  JErec,  Gregorius^  Der  arme  Heinrich, 
and  Iwein. 

The  first  and  last  of  these  are  Arthurian  romances,  and 
both  are  based  on  epics  by  Hartmann's  French  master, 
Chretien  de  Troyes.  Between  these  two  epics,  of  which 
the  first  was  written  about  1191,  the  second  ten  or  fifteen 
years  later,  there  is  all  the  difference  of  style  and  composi- 
tion which  distinguishes  the  work  of  a  beginner  from  that 
of  a  finished  master,  but  in  other  respects  they  are  com- 
plementary. Erec  is  a  young  knight  of  the  Round  Table 
who  wins  the  hand  of  Enite,  the  daughter  of  a  poor  Graf, 
and,  in  the  excess  of  his  love  for  her,  forgets  his  duties  as 
a  knight.  Hurt  by  people's  reproaches,  Enite  goes  out 
into  the  world  of  adventure  with  him,  and  helps  him  to 
win  back  his  good  name  as  a  knight.  Iwein  presents  the 
converse  picture.  In  the  spirit  of  adventure  the  hero 
defeats  and  slays  the  possessor  of  a  magic  spring  in  the 
forest,  and  marries  his  widow ;  he  is,  however,  so  devoted 
to  his  profession  of  knighthood  that  he  forgets  his  wife 
entirely.  He  breaks  his  vow  to  return  to  her  at  the  end 
of  a  year,  and  when  reminded  of  this  vow,  is  so  over- 
whelmed by  remorse  that  he  becomes  bereft  of  his  senses 
and  lives  for  a  time  naked  in  the  forest.  Restored  to  health, 
another  series  of  adventures  await  him  before  he  is  ulti- 


HARTMANN    VON    AUE.  35 

mately  reconciled  to  his  wife.  Iwein  is  the  best  example 
in  German  of  the  Arthurian  romance  as  it  was  cultivated 
in  France ;  it  is  admirably  planned  and  proportioned,  and 
free  alike  from  German  diffuseness  and  German  obscurity. 
The  Hartmann  who  wrote  Iwein  is  the  unsurpassed 
master  of  form  and  style  in  the  Middle  High  German 
epic. 

More  personal  and  less  objective  are  the  two  romances, 
which,  in  all  probability,  were  composed  before  Iivein, 
Gregorius,  and  Der  arme  Hdnrich.  The  first  of  these  is 
a  religious  legend  in  which  asceticism  takes  the  place  of 
the  active  optimism  of  the  Arthurian  epic.  Like  a 
Christian  Oedipus,  Gregorius  finds  himself  the  victim  of  a 
terrible  fate  :  he  is  the  child  of  a  brother  and  sister,  the 
husband  of  his  mother.  And  to  expiate  his  crime  he  has 
himself  chained  for  seventeen  years  to  a  rock  in  the  sea, 
where  dripping  water  is  his  only  nourishment ;  in  the  end 
he  is  rewarded  by  being  proclaimed  Pope  by  the  voice  of 
God.  Monastic  and  ascetic  also  is  Der  arme  Heinrich, 
a  legend  possibly  associated  with  the  house  in  whose 
service  Hartmann  himself  stood.  A  certain  Heinrich  von 
Aue  becomes,  at  the  height  of  his  prosperity,  stricken 
with  leprosy ;  and  the  physicians  tell  him  that  the  only 
remedy  is  the  blood  of  a  young  girl,  who,  of  her  own  free 
will,  gives  her  life  for  him.  The  daughter  of  a  farmer, 
with  whom  Heinrich  has  taken  refuge,  is  ready  to  sacri- 
fice herself;  but  at  the  last  moment,  when  the  knife  is 
being  whetted,  Heinrich  repents  ;  he  calls  to  the  physician 
to  stay  his  hand ;  he  will  rather  die  himself.  The  disease 
disappears,  and  the  farmer's  daughter  ultimately  becomes 
Heinrich's  wife.  Skilfully  planned  and  sympathetically 
told,  Der  arme  Heinrich  is  one  of  the  most  charming  idylls 
in  mediaeval  literature. 

While  Hartmann's  supreme  merit  was,  without  denying 
his  own  poetic  individuality,  to  have  familiarised  Germany 
with  the  clear,  well-proportioned  art  of  the  French  master 
of  the  Arthurian  romance,  the  two  other  great  poets  of 
the  Court  Epic,  and,  above  all,  Wolfram  von  Eschenbach, 
were  more  original.  No  European  poet,  indeed,  before 


36  THE    COURT   EPIC. 

Dante  can  vie  with  Wolfram  in  grandeur  of  imagination 
and  depth  of  insight  into  the  springs  of  human  action  ; 
he  is  the  profoundest  Germanic  poet  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
When  he  was  born  we  do  not  know ;  but  he  seems  to 
have  been  of  about  the  same  age  as  Hartmann.  He  may 
have  lived  until  1220.  He  took  his  name  from  the  little 
Bavarian  (then  Prankish)  town  of  Eschenbach,  which  lies 
not  far  from  Ansbach,  and  here  he  was  probably  born. 
Compared  with  Hartmann,  he  was  comparatively  illiterate  ; 
he  even  tells  us  he  could  not  read  or  write.  Whether  this 
statement  is  to  be  taken  as  strictly  true  or  not,  his  com- 
parative freedom  from  the  trammels  of  French  romance,  the 
naturalness  of  his  outlook  on  life,  and  his  sturdy  humour, 
show,  at  least,  that  literary  traditions  did  not  lie  heavy  on 
him.  Wolfram  von  Eschenbach  was  repeatedly  the  guest 
of  the  great  patron  of  Middle  High  German  poetry,  the 
Landgraf  Hermann  of  Thuringia,  and  there  is  ground  for 
believing  that  at  least  the  sixth  and  seventh  books  of  his 
epic,  Parzival,  were  written,  not  long  after  1203,  in  the 
Wartburg  near  Eisenach ;  in  any  case  the  poem  was  com- 
posed at  the  beginning  of  the  thirteenth  century. 

Parzival  is  an  epic  of  nearly  25,000  lines,  divided  over 
sixteen  books ;  it  unrolls  in  the  leisurely  fashion  of  chival- 
ric  romance  the  story  of  Parzival,  son  of  Gahmuret  of 
Anjou  and  Queen  Herzeloyde  of  Valois,  from  his  careless, 
idyllic  childhood  in  the  forest,  where  his  mother  brings 
him  up  in  order  to  preserve  him  from  the  temptations  of 
adventure,  which  had  proved  fatal  to  his  father,  to  the 
culmination  of  his  life,  when  he  is  crowned  king  of  the 
Gral.  It  differs  from  other  epic  romances  in  being  not 
merely  a  book  of  adventure ;  it  is  also  a  story  of  spiritual 
growth,  the  history  of  a  soul  in  its  journey  through  the 
trials  and  temptations  of  life ;  for  Parzival's  ultimate 
triumph  is  due  to  his  purity  and  singleness  of  purpose, 
to  his  power  of  rising  superior  to  the  doubts  and  despairs 
through  which  he  passes. 

To  the  child  of  the  forest  the  existence  of  the  great 
world  outside  is  first  revealed  by  knights  in  armour, 
the  bpy  believes  to  be  gods,  for  his  mother  had 


WOLFRAM   VON    ESCHENBACH's    "  PARZIVAL."      37 

taught  him  that  God  was  bright  and  shining.  From 
these  knights  he  learns  the  knowledge  his  mother  would 
fain  have  kept  from  him,  and  he  begs  to  be  allowed  to 
seek  the  court  of  King  Arthur.  Herzeloyde  lets  him 
go,  but,  in  the  hope  that  he  may  be  driven  back  to 
her  by  the  mockery  of  men,  she  dresses  him  in  the 
garb  of  a  fool.  Parzival,  however,  does  not  return, 
and  his  mother  dies  of  a  broken  heart.  Meanwhile 
on  his  way  to  King  Arthur  he  becomes,  through  his 
very  innocence  and  ignorance  of  the  laws  of  chivalry, 
involved  in  guilt;  he  kills  a  noble  knight  and  robs  a 
noble  lady  of  her  ring  and  brooch.  From  King  Arthur's 
court  he  finds  his  way  to  the  castle  of  an  old  knight, 
Gurnemanz  of  Graharz,  who  receives  him  hospitably  and 
gives  him  the  wisdom  of  which  he  stands  so  sorely  in 
need.  Once  more  he  goes  out  into  the  world,  still 
pure  of  heart,  but  no  longer  a  simpleton,  and  by  his 
first  deed  of  prowess  wins  the  heart  and  hand  of  a 
beautiful  queen,  Kondwiramur,  who  becomes  his  wife. 

Parzival's  thoughts  now  revert  to  his  mother  in  the 
forest,  and  he  resolves  to  seek  her  out,  ignorant  of  the 
fact  that  his  long  absence  has  cost  her  her  life.  To- 
wards evening  on  the  first  day  he  arrives  at  a  lake, 
and  inquires  of  some  fishermen  where  he  may  find  a 
night's  lodging.  The  most  distinguished  among  them 
directs  Parzival  to  a  castle  in  the  neighbourhood  where 
he  will  himself  be  his  host.  Parzival  is  well  received, 
and  led  into  a  hall  where  sit  four  hundred  knights ;  his 
host,  beside  whom  he  is  placed,  is  no  other  than  King 
Anfortas,  the  king  of  the  Gral.  According  to  the  in- 
terpretation of  the  church,  the  Holy  Gral,  a  vessel  of 
miraculous  powers,  was  identified  with  the  cup  from 
which  Christ  drank  at  the  Last  Supper,  and  in  which 
Joseph  of  Arimathea  received  His  blood  when  He  was 
nailed  to  the  cross.  In  Wolfram's  Parzival  it  has 
become  a  precious  stone,  which  possesses  marvellous 
powers  of  supplying  meat  and  drink ;  those  powers, 
however,  have  to  be  renewed  once  each  year,  on  Good 
Friday,  by  a  dove  that  descends  from  heaven.  Parzival 


38  THE    COURT    EPIC. 

is  now  the  witness  of  the  mystic  ceremony  of  the  Oral. 
He  sees  the  bleeding  spear  borne  through  the  hall,  and 
hears  the  knights  groaning  when  they  see  it ;  he  ob- 
serves that  his  host,  Anfortas,  suffers  from  a  wound  that 
will  not  heal,  and  through  a  half-open  door  he  catches 
a  glimpse  of  King  Titurel,  old  and  ashen  pale.  But  all 
this  he  sees  and  hears  in  silence ;  no  question  crosses 
his  lips  as  to  what  it  all  means,  no  word  of  sympathy  for 
the  sufferers. 

Next  morning  when  he  wakens,  he  finds  the  company 
of  the  previous  evening  gone,  and  leaves  the  castle ;  only 
later  does  he  learn  that  he  has  been  in  the  castle  of 
Monsalvatsch,  the  castle  of  the  Gral.  He  returns  to 
the  court  of  King  Arthur,  where  the  sorceress  Kundrie, 
the  messenger  of  the  Gral,  confronts  him  and  curses 
him  for  his  lack  of  sympathy  on  the  evening  at  Mon- 
salvatsch. One  word  of  sympathy  from  his  lips  would 
have  brought  relief  and  healing  to  the  sufferers.  Parzival 
is  overcome  by  his  sense  of  guilt ;  he  feels  dishonoured, 
and  sets  out  again  to  seek  the  castle  of  the  Gral  and 
repair  his  fatal  omission ;  and  for  four  long  years  he 
wanders  in  the  Valley  of  the  Shadow,  doubting,  despair- 
ing, seeking,  fighting,  but  still  untarnished  in  heart  and 
soul,  still  facing  life  with  manly  courage.  Meanwhile 
Wolfram  turns  aside  from  his  hero's  adventures  to  re- 
late those  of  Gawan,  the  more  worldly  ideal  of  the 
Arthurian  knight,  who  serves  as  a  kind  of  foil  to  the 
guileless  hero. 

In  the  ninth  book  we  return  again  to  Parzival,  who, 
hopeless  and  despairing,  is  rebuked  by  an  old  knight  for 
bearing  arms  on  Good  Friday.  The  knight  induces 
Parzival  to  seek  out  a  hermit  in  the  forest,  and  to 
unburden  to  him  his  load  of  sin.  His  horse  guides 
him  to  the  place,  where  he  finds  Trevrizent,  the  brother 
of  Anfortas  and  Herzeloyde,  his  own  uncle.  What 
Gurnemanz  did  for  him  in  the  first  part  of  the  story, 
Trevrizent  does  now ;  Parzival  opens  his  heart  to  the 
hermit,  and  learns  from  him  what  path  he  must  follow 
if  he  will  find  again  the  Gral.  Two  great  trials  of  valour 


"TITUREL"  AND  "WILLEHALM."  39 

and  strength  await  him  before  the  goal  is  reached  ;  he 
must  overcome  both  Gawan  and  his  own  half-brother, 
Feirefiz.  Then  he  returns  once  more  to  the  castle  of 
Monsalvatsch,  and  asks  the  question  of  sympathy  which 
releases  the  sufferers  from  the  spell.  He  is  reunited 
with  Kondwiramur,  and  himself  becomes  king  of  the 
Gral.  So  closes  this  epic  of  human  suffering  and  of  the 
redeeming  power  of  sympathy,  an  epic  which  crystallises 
into  poetry,  as  no  other  work  of  its  time,  the  spiritual 
aspiration,  the  naive  beauty  and  emotional  intensity  of 
mediaeval  Christianity.  In  Parzival  himself  the  worldly 
and  the  spiritual  blend  to  form  the  perfect  knight. 

Wolfram  von  Eschenbach  is  the  author  of  two  other 
poems,  the  so-called  Titurel,  of  which  the  leading  figures, 
Schionatulander  and  Sigune,  appeared  episodically  in  the 
great  epic ;  and  Willehalm,  a  version  of  the  French 
Bataille  (FAliscans.  Both  were  written  subsequently  to 
Parzival.  The  first  of  these  poems  is  composed  in  a 
strophic  metre  similar  to  that  of  the  popular  epic,  and 
shows  Wolfram's  art  from  a  new  side ;  it  is  a  fragmentary 
love-story,  an  idyllic  episode  rather  than  an  epic  romance. 
In  Willehalm,  on  the  other  hand,  the  subject  of  which 
was  suggested  to  Wolfram  by  the  Landgraf  of  Thuringia, 
we  find  a  stormier,  more  virile  life  than  was  depicted 
either  in  Parzival  or  Titurel ;  Parzival  had  presented 
a  picture  of  the  Christian  hero  in  the  ideal  world  of 
romance ;  Willehalm  portrays  the  Christian  hero  as  a 
soldier  fighting  for  his  faith.  The  gentle,  unworldly 
Kondwiramur  stands  in  similar  contrast  to  Willehalm's 
noble  and  heroic  wife  Gyburg,  the  finest  of  all  Wolfram's 
women.  But,  like  Parzival,  this  poem  is  also  domi- 
nated by  the  poet's  own  personality,  his  calm,  just  out- 
look on  life  and  the  nobility  of  soul  which  enabled  him 
to  rise  superior  to  the  strife  of  factions  and  the  differ- 
ences of  religious  faith. 

The  third  of  the  great  medieval  epic  poets  is  Gottfried 
von  Strassburg,  of  whose  life  we  are  even  more  completely 
in  ignorance  than  of  Hartmann's  or  Wolfram's  ;  we  have, 
however,  direct  evidence'  in  an  acrostic  that  he  was  the 


40  THE    COURT    EPIC. 

author  of  the  epic  of  Tristan.  We  can  also  infer  that 
Gottfried  was  a  learned  poet,  that  is  to  say,  familiar 
with  both  Latin  and  French,  and  that,  unlike  the  others, 
he  did  not  belong  to  the  nobility ;  to  contemporaries 
he  is  always  "  Meister "  Gottfried,  not  "  Herr."  From 
internal  evidence  it  is  possible  to  fix  the  date  of  the 
poem  as  approximately  1210.  The  source  of  Tristan 
is,  to  some  extent,  a  matter  of  conjecture.  Chretien  de 
Troyes  wrote  an  epic  on  the  subject,  which  is  lost,  and  it 
would  be  natural  to  assume  that  Gottfried  had  found  his 
materials  here.  He  expressly  mentions,  however,  a  certain 
"  Thomas  of  Brittany  "  as  his  source,  and  a  few  fragments 
of  an  old  French  Tristan  by  a  "jongleur"  of  this  name 
have  been  discovered.  These  fragments  are,  for  the  most 
part,  from  a  part  of  the  poem  which  Gottfried  did  not 
reach,  his  epic  being  unfinished,  but  there  is  sufficient 
correspondence  to  place  his  indebtedness  beyond  question. 
Tristan's  father,  Riwalin  of  Parmenia,  fell  in  battle 
before  his  son  was  born,  and  his  mother,  Blancheflur, 
died  in  giving  birth  to  him  ;  he  is  brought  up  by  the 
faithful  marshal  Rual,  and  astonishes  everyone  by  his 
precocious  powers.  Carried  off  by  Norse  merchants,  he 
is  landed  on  the  coast  of  Cornwall,  and  makes  his  way  to 
the  castle  of  Tintajoel,  where  King  Marke  holds  his 
court.  Here  his  foster-father  finds  him  after  a  search 
of  four  years,  and  discloses  to  the  king  and  to  himself 
who  he  is.  Thereupon  King  Marke  appoints  him  his 
heir,  and  amidst  the  ceremony  of  the  mediaeval  "  Schwert- 
leite,"  Tristan  is  invested  with  the  honours  of  knighthood. 
The  young  hero's  first  business  is  to  avenge  his  father's 
murder  in  Parmenia ;  he  reconquers  that  country  and 
hands  it  over  to  his  foster-father's  sons.  He  then  returns 
to  Cornwall,  where  he  undertakes  to  free  the  land  from 
an  intolerable  tribute  imposed  upon  it  by  the  Irish  king 
Gurmun  and  his  brother-in-law  Morold.  The  matter 
depends  on  single  combat  with  Morold.  Tristan  over- 
comes him,  but  receives  a  wound  which,  as  his  dying 
opponent  tells  him,  can  only  be  cured  by  his  sister,  the 
Irish  queen.  Morold's  brother  'is  taken  back  to  Ireland, 


GOTTFRIED   VON    STRASSBURG'S   "TRISTAN."      4! 

and  the  queen  preserves  a  splinter  of  Tristan's  sword, 
which  she  finds  in  the  wound.  In  search  of  healing, 
Tristan  finds  his  way  to  Ireland,  where,  disguised  as  a 
"  Spielmann,"  he  wins  the  interest  of  the  young  princess 
Isolde  for  his  art ;  in  return  for  the  instruction  he  gives 
her,  her  mother  heals  his  wound.  Meanwhile  the  Cornish 
noblemen  are  growing  jealous  of  Tristan's  influence  at  his 
uncle's  court,  and  in  the  hopes  of  preventing  Tristan  suc- 
ceeding him,  they  propose  to  the  king  that  he  should 
marry.  The  young  Isolde,  of  whom  Tristan  has  brought 
back  favourable  reports,  is  chosen,  and  Tristan  is  sent  as 
envoy  to  Dublin.  She  recognises  in  him  the  Spielmann 
of  former  days  and  loves  him ;  but  her  love  is  suddenly 
turned  to  hate,  when,  by  means  of  the  sword -splinter 
her  mother  has  preserved,  she  discovers  that  King 
Marke's  envoy  is  the  murderer  of  her  uncle.  She  is 
about  to  avenge  herself  on  him  when  her  mother  inter- 
venes, and  after  Tristan  has  explained  his  mission,  Isolde's 
father  consents  to  her  union  with  Marke.  On  the  voyage 
to  Cornwall  Isolde's  hatred  of  her  companion  is  by  an 
unhappy  accident  turned  to  the  fiercest  passion  ;  they 
drink  together,  in  mistake  for  wine,  a  love-potion  which 
Isolde's  mother  had  prepared  for  her  and  Marke,  in  order 
to  ensure  a  happy  marriage.  This  passion  grows  in  in- 
tensity, and  the  honour  of  vassal  and  bride-elect  are  alike 
forgotten.  The  marriage  with  King  Marke  is  celebrated, 
and  the  love  of  Tristan  and  Isolde  kept  a  secret  from  the 
king.  The  epic  now  becomes  a  story  of  love  intrigue,  in 
which  the  cunning  deception  practised  by  the  lovers  is 
again  and  again  on  the  brink  of  being  discovered.  At 
last,  however,  Tristan  and  Isolde  are  banished  from  the 
court,  and  love  again  is  supreme  in  the  seclusion  of  the 
"  Minnegrotte,"  where  they  take  refuge.  Reconciliation 
with  the  king  follows,  then  another  discovery.  This  time 
Tristan  has  to  flee.  At  the  court  of  the  Duke  of  Arundel 
he  hopes  to  forget  Isolde,  and  meets  there  another  Isolde, 
"  Isolde  with  the  white  hands,"  to  whom  he  transfers  his 
affection.  But  although  he  marries  her,  the  effects  of  the 
love-potion  are  not  to  be  destroyed ;  he  is  irresistibly 


42  THE    COURT   EPIC. 

drawn  back  to  Cornwall,  where  more  adventures  await 
him.  Again  we  find  him  united  to  his  wife,  but  he  has 
returned  with  a  wound  from  a  poisoned  spear,  and 
only  the  Isolde  of  Cornwall  can  cure  him.  A  messenger 
is  dispatched  to  fetch  her,  and  it  is  arranged  that  if  she 
returns  with  the  ship,  it  is  to  bear  a  white  sail,  if  not,  a 
black  one.  Tristan's  wife  is,  however,  jealous  and  deceives 
him,  telling  him  that  the  sail  of  the  approaching  vessel  is 
black.  He  succumbs  before  the  ship  reaches  the  shore, 
and  Isolde  of  Cornwall  dies  of  grief  at  his  side.  The 
secret  of  the  fatal  potion  is  revealed  to  King  Marke,  and 
he  has  the  lovers  buried  side  by  side  in  Cornish  soil ;  a 
vine  and  rose,  planted  on  their  graves,  intertwine. 

Gottfried  did  not  live  to  complete  his  epic,  and,  to  find 
the  end  of  the  story  after  Tristan's  marriage  to  the  white- 
handed  Isolde,  we  have  to  turn  to  his  continuers,  Ulrich 
von  Tiirheim,  who  wrote  about  1240,  and  Heinrich  von 
Freiberg  (ca.  1300),  a  much  more  gifted  poet  than  Ulrich. 
Gottfried's  Tristan,  no  less  than  Iwein  and  Parzival,  is 
one  of  the  masterpieces  of  mediseval  literature ;  clear, 
pellucid,  written  with  a  mastery  of  language  inferior  to 
that  of  no  other  mediseval  poet,  Tristan  is  a  romance  of 
inexhaustible  charm.  So  true  and  living  do  Gottfried's 
figures  stand  out  against  the  background,  so  wonderfully 
is  their  passion  attuned  to  the  music  of  the  ever-present 
sea,  that  even  the  modern  reader  is  not  wearied  by  the 
recurrence  of  endless  love-adventures.  No  other  poet  of 
the  Middle  Ages  understood,  as  Gottfried  did,  how  to 
describe  a  great  passion ;  none  realised,  as  he  had  done, 
the  intense  earnestness  of  those  whose  lives  are  in  its  grip. 
Not  a  touch  of  lightness,  not  a  gleam  of  frivolity,  lightens 
the  grim  pessimism,  in  which  the  old  Germanic  virtue 
of  unflinching  loyalty  succumbs  before  the  sinister  power 
which  holds  two  noble  souls  in  its  grasp. 

With  these  three  poets,  Hartmann,  Wolfram,  and  Gott- 
fried, the  German  Arthurian  epic  touches  its  highest 
point ;  the  literature  which  followed,  in  so  far  at  least  as 
it  restricted  itself  to  the  Arthurian  stories,  was  little  more 
than  unoriginal  and  uninspired  imitation.  And  in  pro- 


IMITATORS    OF    HARTMANN    AND    WOLFRAM.       43 

portion  as  the  influence  of  one  or  other  of  the  chief  poets 
predominates,  it  is  possible  to  group  the  work  of  their 
successors. 

To  the  imitators  of  Hartmann — and  Hartmann  had  the 
most  immediate  influence  upon  his  contemporaries — 
belong  Ulrich  von  Zatzikoven,  a  Swiss  poet  who  wrote  a 
Lanzelet  about  1195,  and,  perhaps  most  gifted  of  all  the 
minor  poets  of  the  age,  Wirnt  von  Gravenberg,  a  Bavarian 
nobleman,  who  about  1205  wrote  his  Wigalois,  an  epic, 
the  hero  of  which  is  Gawan's  son.  Gawan  himself  is  the 
subject  of  a  long,  planless  poem,  Die  Krone  (i.e.,  "  the 
crown  of  all  adventures "),  which  a  Carinthian  poet, 
Heinrich  von  Tiirlin,  wrote  under  Hartmann's  influence 
about  1 2  20  or  a  little  earlier.  Hartmann's  style  may 
still  be  traced  in  the  second  half  of  the  thirteenth 
century,  in  the  epics  of  a  poet  of  Salzburg  known  as 
"  der  Pleier."  But  while  these  imitators  of  Hartmann 
have,  one  and  all,  taken  over  their  master's  way  of  looking 
at  life,  that  dualism  which  presents  the  forces  of  light 
and  darkness  in  even  balance,  not  one  grasped  the  import- 
ance of  the  greatest  lesson  he  had  to  teach,  the  lesson  of 
artistic  form. 

As  was  to  be  expected,  the  influence  of  Wolfram  was 
still  less  conducive  to  style  and  proportion ;  indeed,  the 
very  originality  of  Wolfram  deteriorated,  in  his  successors, 
into  a  mannerism.  His  influence  on  the  Court  epic  be- 
came more  marked  as  the  thirteenth  century  advanced. 
The  chief  poem  of  Wolfram's  school  is  Der  jungere 
Titurel,  a  long  romance,  written  about  1270  by  a  Bavarian, 
perhaps  Albrecht  von  Scharfenberg  by  name,  and  built 
up  on  the  fragments  of  Wolfram's  Titurel.  Of  Wolfram's 
understanding  for  the  spiritual  side  of  life  there  is  little 
in  his  successors ;  but  something  of  the  imaginative  mys- 
ticism of  Wolfram's  Gral  story  has  at  least  passed  over 
into  Der  jungere  Titurel.  To  the  group  of  literature 
associated  with.  Parzival  belong  also  two  other  Bavarian 
poems,  Der  heilige  Georg,  by  Reinbot  von  Duren  (ca. 
1240),  and  Lohengrin,  written  at  a  still  later  date  (between 
1276  and  1290)  than  Der  jungere  Titurel. 


44  THE    COURT    EPIC. 

The  influence  of  Gottfried  of  Strassburg  spread  more 
rapidly.  In  12 20  a  Swiss  poet,  Konrad  Fleck,  imitated 
him  in  a  love  epic,  Flore  und  Blancheflur,  and  the  two 
continuers  of  Tristan,  already  mentioned,  were  more 
or  less  disciples  of  Gottfried.  There  was  a  more 
modern  element  in  Gottfried's  art  which  appealed  with 
increasing  force  as  time  went  on  to  the  poets  of  the  Court 
epic ;  and  it  is  not  surprising  to  find  that  his  influence  is 
paramount  on  the  two  chief  poets  of  the  later  period, 
Rudolf  von  Ems  and  Konrad  von  Wtirzburg.  The  first 
of  these  was  a  native  of  Switzerland,  taking  his  name  from 
Ems  near  Chur.  He  has  left  a  vast  quantity  of  verse, 
which,  however,  partakes  more  of  the  character  of 
chronicle  than  romance.  Only  in  his  early  period,  in 
poems  like  Der  gute  Gerhart  and  Barlaam  und  Josaphat, 
which  were  written  not  long  after  1220,  does  Rudolf 
keep  himself  sufficiently  free  from  religious  asceticism 
and  pedantic  detail  to  appeal  to  his  readers'  interest 
from  the  purely  poetic  side  ;  even  his  Wilhelm  von 
Or/ens,  written  between  1231  and  1238,  a  romance  of 
chivalry,  is  dry  and  tedious,  and  his  Weltchronik,  a 
history  of  the  world  down  to  the  age  of  Solomon,  is 
rather  an  encyclopaedia  of  mediaeval  learning  than  a 
poem.  All  that  such  a  poet  could  learn  from  Gottfried 
was  the  method  of  presenting  his  subject ;  the  warm  life, 
the  pagan  revelling  in  passion,  which  provided  the  atmo- 
sphere of  Gottfried's  Tristan,  could  mean  nothing  to 
Rudolfs  dry,  ascetic  temperament. 

A  poet  of  a  different  stamp  was  Konrad  von  Wurzburg, 
who,  probably  a  native  of  Wurzburg,  died  at  Basel  in 
1287  ;  he  began  to  write  not  long  after  Rudolf  von  Ems' 
death  in  1254.  Konrad  has  left  a  considerable  body  of 
narrative  poetry  behind  him,  characterised  by  a  healthy 
realism  and  told  in  that  effective  narrative  style  he  had 
learned  from  Gottfried ;  but  Konrad,  compared  with 
his  master,  fails,  as  all  the  minor  Middle  High  German 
poets  fail,  in  being  unable  to  distinguish  the  essential 
from  the  unessential,  the  poetic  from  the  prosaic.  He 
began  by  writing  religious  legends,  such  as  Alexius,  and 


KONRAD   VON   WURZBURG.  45 

poems  with  strongly  marked  religious  tendencies,  like  Der 
JVelt  Lohn  and  Die  goldene  Schmiede,  the  latter  an 
allegorical  glorification  of  the  Virgin.  From  these  he 
passed  to  more  worldly  romances,  such  as  Kaiser  Otto^ 
Die  Herzemdre — the  story  of  a  knight  who,  dying  in  the 
East,  commands  that  his  heart  be  taken  back  to  his 
mistress,  whereupon  the  latter's  husband  has  it  cooked 
and  served  up  to  her — and  Konrad's  paean  in  honour 
of  friendship,  Engelhart.  In  these  short  romances 
Konrad  is  seen  at  his  best.  The  unwieldy  epics  of 
Partenopier  (ca.  1277),  a  fantastic  fairy  romance,  which 
shows  only  too  plainly  the  decadence  of  the  epic,  and 
Der  trojanische  Krieg,  his  last  work,  the  longest  epic  in 
Middle  High  German  literature,  are  so  extraordinarily 
diffuse  and  ill-constructed  that  it  is  difficult  for  the  modern 
reader  to  extract  from  them  even  the  modicum  of  poetry 
they  contain. 

Besides  the  gradual  sinking  of  the  Arthurian  romance, 
the  narrative  literature  of  the  thirteenth  century  shows 
two  distinct  developments,  both  of  which  were  due  to 
the  demand  for  a  more  faithful  presentment  of  life 
than  is  to  be  found  in  the  great  poets.  One  form  in 
which  this  craving  for  reality  showed  itself,  was  the  grow- 
ing tendency  to  substitute  the  truth  of  the  chronicle  for 
the  romantic  fiction  of  chivalry  ;  the  other  development 
tended  to  discountenance  the  knight  in  this  era  of  social 
change  and  to  deal  with  the  lives  and  adventures  of 
ordinary  men  and  women.  To  the  former  phase  belong, 
besides  avowed  chronicle  poets  like  Rudolf  von  Ems, 
the  writers  of  semi-historical  romances,  such  as  Ulrich 
von  Eschenbach  and  Berthold  von  Holle.  The  second 
tendency  was  productive  of  more  important  poetical 
results  ;  we  owe  to  it  a  revival  of  the  "  Schwank  "  of  the 
mediaeval  Spielmann,  an  example  of  which  is  the  Pfaffe 
Amis  of  the  "  Strieker,"  a  Rhenish  poet  of  the  earlier 
thirteenth  century  who  passed  part  of  his  life  in 
Austria,  and  also  the  admirable  peasant  romance  by 
Wernher  der  Gartenaere,  Meier  Helmbrecht,  which  was 
written  before  the  middle  of  the  century.  This  story 


40  THE    COURT    EPIC. 

of  the  discontented  peasant  who  degenerates  into  a 
freebooter  and  ends  his  life  on  the  gallows,  is  the 
reverse  of  the  ideal  pictures  which  the  poets  of  an 
earlier  generation  had  drawn ;  it  is  a  forerunner,  in  its 
unflinching  realism,  of  a  large  body  of  German  narrative 
poetry  in  the  next  few  centuries.  The  actual  conflict 
of  the  new  realism  and  social  ideals  with  the  world  of 
chivalry  is  illustrated  by  the  two  poems,  Frauenditnst 
(1255)  and  the  Frauenbuch  (1257),  written  by  a  Styrian 
knight,  Ulrich  von  Lichtenstein,  who  was  probably  born 
about  1 200.  These  books,  descriptions  of  the  poet's 
own  adventures  as  a  knight  and  a  lover,  make  a  vain 
effort  to  uphold  the  old  ideals  amidst  the  decadence  of 
the  new  age.  The  many  lyrics  which  are  interspersed 
in  Ulrich's  narrative  give  him  a  prominent  place  in  the 
history  of  the  Minnesang. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  fourteenth  century  the  Arthur- 
ian epic  was  virtually  dead ;  it  had  been  a  kind  of  mirror 
held  up  to  chivalry,  reflecting  with  extraordinary  sensitive- 
ness the  changes  to  which  knighthood  was  exposed  ;  and 
as  soon  as  the  old  social  order  passed  away,  its  degenera- 
tion set  in  with  rapidity.  The  Court  epic  ceased  to  be 
the  bearer  of  a  great  poetic  ideal,  and  became  merely  a 
form,  and  an  inferior  one,  of  the  entertaining  literature 
of  its  day. 


47 


CHAPTER   V. 

MINNESANG    AND    DIDACTIC    POETRY. 

As  we  have  already  seen  in  considering  the  beginnings 
of  Middle  High  German  poetry,  the  origin  of  the  third 
great  group  of  that  poetry,  the  lyric  or  Minnesang,  presents 
more  difficult  problems  than  either  of  the  other  two. 
But  whether  the  German  Minnesang  was,  like  the  Popular 
Epic,  indigenous  in  its  origins  or  not,  it  at  least  responded 
with  alacrity  to  the  stimulus  which  came  with  chivalry 
from  the  west ;  at  a  very  early  stage  it  adopted  not  merely 
the  form  of  the  French  or  Provencal  lyric,  but  also  its 
themes  and  even  its  general  social  ethics  and  conventions. 
At  the  same  time,  the  German  singer  was  no  artificial 
imitator;  he  honestly  sang  of  what  he  felt,  even  when 
he  was  expressing  himself  in  stereotyped  words,  images, 
and  forms.  The  Minnesinger  was  quick  to  realise  where 
he  could  no  longer  follow  his  Proven9al  model  and  where 
his  mental  horizon  no  longer  coincided  with  the  latter's ; 
the  German  poet  took  over  the  conventions  of  the 
French  lyric,  but  he  put  at  an  early  date  his  own 
German  stamp  upon  them.  This  is  particularly  noticeable 
in  the  more  spiritual  and  mystic  meaning  which  was  given 
to  the  word  "  Minne,"  as  compared  with  the  personal  and 
concrete  "  amour  "  of  the  French  poets.  Thus,  when  due 
allowance  is  made  for  the  peculiar  conditions  of  mediseval 
poetry — the  existence  of  binding  traditions  affecting  the 
whole  body  of  chivalric  literature,  Romance  as  well  as 
Germanic — it  is  possible  to  understand  how  the  Minne- 
sang could  be  dependent  on  forms  originally  foreign, 


48  MINNESANG   AND    DIDACTIC    POETRY. 

and  at  the  same  time  be  the  vehicle  of  a  national  lyric 
sentiment. 

In  the  early  beginnings  of  the  Minnesang,  which  have 
already  been  traced,  a  purely  German  lyric,  or  what  ap- 
pears to  be  such,  may  be  found  beside  the  conventional 
lyric  of  chivalry ;  but  at  a  comparatively  early  date  the 
fusion  of  the  two  was  complete.  The  first  master  of  the 
epic,  Heinrich  von  Veldeke,  was  at  the  same  time  the 
initiator  of  this  new  phase  in  the  development  of  the  lyric ; 
in  more  than  fifty  lyric  strophes,  which  he  has  left  us, 
he  has  succeeded  in  combining  the  French  conventions 
with  the  natural  sentiment  of  ,the  light-hearted  Rhine- 
lander.  From  the  Rhine,  too,  came  Friedrich  von  Hausen, 
one  of  Barbarossa's  crusaders,  who  died  in  1190  in  battle 
with  the  Turk.  The  influence  of  the  Provengal  lyric  is 
strong  on  Friedrich's  poetry,  but  one  obtains,  notwith- 
standing, a  clear  idea  from  his  songs  of  the  personality 
of  this  manly,  if  somewhat  melancholy,  soldier  -  poet. 
More  gifted  and  original  was  the  Thuringian,  Hein- 
rich von  Morungen,  who  represents  a  further  stage  in 
the  adaptation  of  the  French  lyric  to  German  needs ; 
in  his  language,  and  especially  in  his  lighter  and  gayer 
mood,  he  widened  the  range  of  expression  of  the  German 
Minnesang.  Hartmann  von  Aue  sought  in  his  lyrics  as 
in  his  narrative  poetry  a  remedy  for  the  spiritual  dissension 
which  he  felt  so  keenly ;  all  the  poems  by  him  that  have 
been  preserved  are  religious  in  tone,  and  were  evidently 
written  in  those  years  of  doubt  and  despair,  which  have 
also  left  their  traces  on  his  epics.  Less  easily  did  Wol- 
fram's rugged  genius  adapt  itself  to  the  narrow  confines 
of  the  lyric ;  what  we  possess  of  his  is  more  the  descrip- 
tion of  a  dramatic  situation  than  the  subjective  reflex  of 
the  poet's  own  emotional  experience.  Lastly,  two  or 
three  lyrics  have  come  down  to  us  under  Gottfried's 
name,  but  it  is  almost  certain  that  they  are  not  his. 

The  master  of  the  German  Minnesang,  and  one  of 
the  greatest  of  all  lyric  poets,  is  Walther  von  der  Vogel- 
weide,  who  lived  from  about  1170  to  about  1228.  The 
exact  date  of  his  birth  and  where  he  was  born  are  unknown. 


WALTHER   VON    DER  VOGELWEIDE.  49 

Many  places  have  striven  for  the  honour  of  being  Walther's 
birthplace,  but  all  that  can  be  said  is  that  he  was  most 
probably  a  native  of  the  Austrian  Tirol.  He  was  of 
noble  family — the  title  "  Herr  "  implies  this — but  so  poor 
that  he  was  obliged  to  win  his  bread  by  his  talents  as  a 
"  fahrender  Sanger." 

The  first  definite  knowledge  we  have  of  Walther  is  that 
he  spent  his  early  years  at  the  court  of  Duke  Leopold  V. 
in  Vienna,  and  that  he  here  attracted  the  attention  of 
Reinmar  von  Hagenau,  or  Reinmar  der  Alte,  an  Alsatian 
poet  who  had  made  Vienna  his  home.  Reinmar  has  left 
a  large  number  of  lyrics,  but  these  rarely  rise  above  the 
conventional  forms  of  the  Minnesang ;  his  theme  is  almost 
invariably  unrequited  love,  and  the  tone  of  his  poetry  is 
monotonously  elegiac.  By  him,  however,  Walther  was 
initiated  into  the  art  of  poetry,  and  when  Reinmar  died, 
about  1 2 10,  Walther  wrote  a  noble  panegyric  of  him. 
Walther  von  der  Vogelweide's  early  lyrics  are  influenced 
by  Reinmar  ;  but  his  tone  is  lighter,  more  youthful  and 
exuberant ;  he  learned  the  art  of  Reinmar's  poetry  with- 
out being  unduly  affected  by  its  mood.  On  the  whole, 
however,  Walther  in  this  early  period  has  not  advanced 
much  beyond  the  artificial  conventions  of  his  time.  He 
left  Vienna  in  1198  and,  for  the  next  ten  or  twelve 
years,  wandered  from  castle  to  castle  as  a  "  Fahrender." 
He  was,  no  doubt,  everywhere  a  welcome  and  hon- 
oured guest,  and  was  often  entertained  by  his  noble 
patrons  for  weeks  at  a  time.  In  this,  the  second 
period  of  Walther's  life,  he  is  the  unapproached  master 
of  the  Minnesang,  as  a  form  of  court  poetry.  Not  all 
the  poems  he  sang  were  based  on  personal  feelings  or 
experience;  at  the  same  time,  he  doubtless  met  by  the 
way  with  love-adventures  of  more  or  less  seriousness  which 
provided  materials  for  his  verse. 

In  the  year  1197,  the  Emperor  Heinrich  VI.  died  un- 
expectedly at  Messina,  and  the  question  of  his  successor 
threw  the  whole  political  life  of  the  Roman  Empire  into 
confusion.  Walther  von  der  Vogelweide  became  a  strong 
partisan  of  Duke  Philip,  the  Swabian  pretender  to  the 


50  MINNESANG    AND    DIDACTIC    POETRY. 

imperial  throne.  Thus,  under  the  stress  of  circumstances, 
Walther  became  a  political  poet,  and,  as  far  as  his  art 
was  concerned,  an  innovator.  He  opened  up  a  field  for 
the  courtly  Minnesang,  which  had  hitherto  been  only 
considered  suitable  for  the  lower  type  of  Spielmann ;  he 
raised  the  old  "Spruch"  to  the  level  of  national  and 
patriotic  song,  and  widened  the  whole  scope  of  mediaeval 
lyric  poetry.  The  history  of  those  stormy  years  in  Ger- 
man history  may  be  followed  step  by  step  in  Walther's 
"  Spruchdichtung " ;  that  is  to  say,  the  gradual  rise  of 
Philip's  fortunes,  until  at  the  height  of  his  prosperty, 
in  1208,  he  was  murdered  by  Otto  of  Wittelsbach. 
Walther  seems  only  to  have  followed  Philip  with  interest 
as  long  as  he  had  adversity  to  fight  against,  and  we  do 
not  know  how  the  tragic  close  of  the  Duke's  career 
affected  the  poet.  In  1212,  however,  Walther  again 
entered  the  lists  as  a  political  singer  ;  the  Pope's  antagonism 
to  the  new  emperor,  Otto  IV.,  at  once  induced  him  to 
take  the  latter's  part.  It  was  not,  however,  until  the  young 
Friedrich  II.,  the  next  Staufen  emperor,  succeeded  to  the 
throne,  that  Walther  reaped  any  benefit  from  his  loyalty 
to  the  reigning  dynasty ;  Friedrich  gave  him  a  small 
estate  and  enabled  him  to  pass  his  last  days  free  from 
care.  Once  more,  in  1227,  Walther  defended  his  emperor 
against  the  interference  of  the  Pope,  and  warmly  advocated 
the  crusade  of  1228.  Whether  Walther  himself  accom- 
panied Friedrich  on  this  crusade  or  not  is  doubtful ;  from 
1228  on  his  life  is  a  blank  to  us.  A  tradition  tells  that 
he  passed  his  last  days  in  Wiir/.burg  and  lies  buried  there, 
but  even  the  year  of  his  death  is  unknown.  It  was 
probably  not  later  than  1230. 

The  last  period  of  Walther's  life  was  at  the  same  time 
that  of  his  greatest  unpolitical  lyric,  his  finest  love-songs. 
Just  as  he  had,  as  "  Spruchdichter,"  passed  beyond  the 
boundaries  of  the  conventional  Minnesang,  so  here,  too, 
he  left  its  prescribed  rules  behind  him  ;  the  conventions 
of  the  "  Minnedienst"  have  ceased  to  be  any  longer  even 
a  scaffolding  for  his  art.  He  now  treats  of  themes  which 
the  courtly  singer  of  the  old  school  would  have  scorned  ; 


WALTHER'S  SUCCESSORS.  51 

and  just  these  songs  of  "  niedere  Minne  " — songs  like 
"  Unter  den  linden,"  one  of  the  most  perfect  gems  of 
mediaeval  German  poetry — are  unsurpassed  in  the  lyric 
poetry  of  the  Middle  Ages.  Thus  in  every  field  of  his 
art,  Walther  broke  new  ground ;  the  supreme  merit 
belongs  to  him  of  having  transformed  the  aristocratic 
Minnesang  into  the  national  lyric  of  his  people.  His 
personal  outlook  in  the  world  was  not  optimistic,  as  it 
could  hardly  have  been  in  one  who  was  exposed  to  the 
buffets  of  so  stormy  an  age.  He  looked  backwards  rather 
than  forwards,  and  as  he  grew  older  the  shadows  on  his 
life  deepened.  To  his  later  years  we  owe  the  splendid 
poetic  melancholy  of  his  elegy :  "  Owe  war  sint  verswunden 
alliu  miniu  jar  !  " 

Perhaps  the  greatest  tribute  of  all  to  Walther's  genius 
is  that  the  later  development  of  the  German  lyric,  down 
into  the  century  of  the  Reformation,  stands  under  his 
influence ;  he  is  the  master  to  whom  the  later  singers, 
Meistersingers  as  well  as  Minnesingers,  look  up  as  to 
an  infallible  lawgiver.  There  were  poets — of  whom  the 
Swabian  Hiltbold  von  Schwangau  may  be  taken  as  rep- 
resentative— who  clung  conservatively  to  the  older  con- 
ventions of  the  courtly  Minnesang,  and  who,  despite  the 
inevitable  influence  of  Walther,  preferred  to  hark  back 
to  the  latter's  predecessors  for  their  models ;  but  the 
majority  of  Walther's  imitators  were  content  to  imitate 
him  slavishly.  Of  the  latter,  Ulrich  von  Singenberg  of 
St  Gall  and  Leuthold  von  Saben  were  not  ungifted  poets, 
although  they  had  little  understanding  for  the  really  vital 
elements  in  Walther's  poetry. 

To  have  had  this  understanding  was  the  conspicuous 
merit  of  the  greatest  of  Walther's  contemporaries  and 
successors,  Neidhart  von  Reuental,  who  lived  from  about 
1 1 80  to  1250.  Neidhart  seized  upon  the  popular  side 
of  Walther's  poetry ;  he  developed  the  lyric  of  "  niedere 
Minne  "  and  created  what  has  been  described  as  "  hofische 
Dorfpoesie,"  village  poetry  under  court  influence.  This 
poetry,  no  less  than  Walther's,  was  intended  for  court 
circles ;  but  by  introducing,  in  a  manner  that  almost 


52  MINNESANG   AND    DIDACTIC    POETRY. 

suggests  a  comparison  with  Heine,  ironical,  piquant,  and 
even  grotesque  elements,  Neidhart  provided  a  new  zest 
for  the  jaded  palates  of  his  audience.  In  verses  attuned 
to  the  season,  the  sprightly,  sharp-tongued  poet  sings  of 
the  peasants  on  whom  he  looks  down  as  upon  a  heavy- 
witted  race.  From  one  point  of  view,  all  this  is  a  descent 
from  the  noble  Minnesang  of  Walther  and  his  pre- 
decessors ;  there  is  a  strain  of  coarseness  in  Neidhart's 
lyric  which  necessarily  appealed  to  a  lower  taste.  But  it 
was  an  inevitable  stage  through  which  the  lyric  had  to 
pass.  The  great  outburst  of  popular  song  in  the  fifteenth 
and  sixteenth  centuries  would  not  have  been  what  it  was, 
had  poets  like  Neidhart  von  Reuental  not  thus  directed 
the  stream  of  the  courtly  Minnesang  into  popular  channels. 

Few  of  the  Minnesinger  of  the  later  half  of  the 
thirteenth  century  escaped  the  influence  of  Neidhart 
von  Reuental.  In  most  of  them,  as  in  Burkhart  von 
Hohenfels,  Ulrich  von  Winterstetten,  and  Gottfried  von 
Neifen,  we  find  the  older  court  lyric  side  by  side  with 
the  peasant  lyric.  But  in  their  natural  temperament 
and  their  outlook  upon  life  the  poets  of  this  period 
were  obviously  more  in  sympathy  with  Neidhart  than 
with  Walther.  "  Der  Tannhauser,"  for  example,  was  a 
rough,  witty  Spielmann,  who  had  little  sympathy  with  the 
solemn  formalities  of  the  old  "  Minnedienst " ;  he  wrote 
under  French  influence,  the  models  most  congenial  to  his 
taste  being  the  French  "  pastourels,"  a  form  of  poetry 
which  is  not  unsimilar  to  Neidhart's  lyric.  In  the  verses 
of  "  Steinmar  " — probably  Berthold  Steinmar  von  Kling- 
enau — the  new  lyric  of  "  niedere  Minne  "  has  been  reduced 
almost  to  a  parody  of  the  higher  Minnesang.  By  the  close 
of  the  thirteenth  century  the  Minnesang  had  become  a 
distant  tradition,  and  when  attempts  were  made  to  revive 
it,  as,  for  example,  by  the  Zurich  citizen,  Johannes  Had- 
laub,  it  made  the  impression  of  being  an  artificial  and 
insincere  cult. 

The  stimulating  qualities  of  Walther's  songs  of  "  niedere 
Minne  "  are  also  to  be  found  in  his  "  Spruchdichtung," 
his  poetic  comments  on  the  political  and  social  questions 


NEIDHART   AND    REINMAR   VON    ZWETER.          53 

of  the  day.  As  Neidhart  developed  the  lower  lyric,  so 
Reinmar  von  Zweter,  a  poet  of  the  Rhineland,  who  passed 
part,  at  least,  of  his  life  in  Austria,  was  Walther's  immedi- 
ate successor  as  a  "  Spruchdichter."  Reinmar's  satire  is 
mild  and  timid,  and  even  his  political  poetry  has  not 
the  vigour  of  his  master's ;  his  verses  are  monotonous 
and  lacking  in  variety ;  but  we  find  in  them,  nevertheless, 
the  germs  of  that  satiric  and  didactic  "  Spruchdichtung  " 
which  was  to  become  so  powerful  a  weapon  in  the  hands 
of  the  social  reformers  of  the  Reformation  age.  From 
now  on,  the  "Spruch"  remains  a  constant  quantity  in 
German  poetry ;  its  scope  was  widened  to  admit  the 
most  outspoken  satire  on  the  one  side,  and  on  the  other 
to  include — as  in  the  verses  of  poets  like  the  "  Marner," 
a  Swabian  who  lived  till  about  1270  —  the  recondite 
learning  of  the  time.  This,  rather  than  the  pure  lyric, 
was  the  form  of  poetry  in  which  the  later  Meistersinger 
schools  delighted  to  exercise  their  art. 

The  transition  from  purely  imaginative  poetry  to  a 
didactic  and  satiric  literature  was  a  characteristic  sign 
of  the  times  in  the  thirteenth  century ;  it  was  intimately 
connected  with  the  social  changes  of  the  age,  the  gradual 
rise  in  importance  of  the  burgher.  The  beginnings  of 
didacticism  in  Middle  High  German  poetry  may,  how- 
ever, be  traced  back  to  the  best  years  of  the  century, 
and  even — as  in  the  case  of  the  Tugendkhre  of  Wernher 
von  Elmendorf,  and  the  long  popular  Disticha  Catoms 
— beyond  it.  A  typical  moral  text-book  of  the  early 
thirteenth  century  was  Der  Winsbeke,  by  a  Bavarian 
Herr  von  Windesbach ;  it  contains,  in  the  form  of  in- 
struction given  by  a  father  to  his  son,  the  code  of 
knightly  virtue  in  an  age  when  the  Arthurian  epic 
held  the  mirror  up  to  chivalry.  As  a  poem  it  has  small 
merit,  and  still  less  has  a  later  companion  poem  Die 
Winsbekin,  the  instruction  of  a  mother  to  her  daughter. 
A  long  step  forward  in  the  direction  of  a  purely  didactic 
literature  is  to  be  seen  in  Der  welsche  Gast,  a  poem  of 
some  15,000  verses,  written  about  1215  by  an  Italian 
churchman,  Thomasin  von  Zirclaere,  and  sent  as  a  "  guest " 


54  MINNESANG    AND    DIDACTIC    POETRY. 

to  German  lands.  Thomasin  destroys  the  poetic  halo 
that  had  surrounded  chivalry,  and  keeps  before  him 
religious  and  moral  aims.  But  he  remains  the  aristocrat, 
to  whom  the  burgher  is  of  small  importance ;  he  still 
looks  up  to  the  Arthurian  epics  as  moral  guides  for  the 
youth  of  the  time.  In  religious  matters  he  insists  on  the 
Pope's  supremacy  in  the  Holy  Roman  Empire,  and  will 
admit  of  no  infringement  of  the  letter  of  the  catholic 
faith. 

Still  more  democratically  didactic  is  a  collection  of 
epigrammatic  "  Spriiche  "  entitled  Bescheidenheit  ("  worldly 
wisdom "),  begun  perhaps  as  early  as  Der  welsche  Gasf, 
but  not  finished  until  some  fifteen  years  later.  The 
author,  who  calls  himself  "  Freidank,"  was  no  doubt  a 
wandering  Spielmann,  but  except  the  fact  that  he  took 
part  in  the  crusade  of  1229,  we  know  nothing  of  him. 
Bescheidenheit  is  a  book  of  the  people  and  for  the  people. 
The  existence  of  knighthood  and  the  ideas  of  chivalry  are 
by  no  means  ignored,  especially  in  the  poet's  discussion 
of  love ;  but  they  have  ceased  to  be  more  than  an  ideal 
in  the  background.  His  point  of  view  is  that  of  the 
common  man,  whose  trusting  piety  did  not  blind  him  to 
the  shortcomings  of  the  church,  whose  implicit  faith  in 
Rome  did  not  bring  with  it  the  belief  that  the  Pope  should 
also  be  the  head  of  the  state  and  dictate  to  a  German 
emperor.  What  Freidank  gives  us  is  not  direct  satire,  but 
it  is  a  preparation  for  the  satire  of  the  coming  centuries. 
Light  is  thrown  on  the  social  conditions  at  the  close  of 
the  thirteenth  century  by  a  collection  of  satirical  poetry 
written  in  Lower  Austria  and  ascribed  to  a  Spielmann, 
Seifried  Helbling ;  a  dialogue  of  questions  and  answers,  a 
form  familiar  in  the  late  Latin  literature  of  this  class,  is 
here  made  the  vehicle  of  a  trenchant  criticism  of  the 
passing  social  order.  Didactic  in  a  more  learned  way  is 
another  poem  of  this  period,  Der  Renner  (so  called 
because  it  was  to  "run"  through  the  world,  to  be  a 
"  cursor  mundi "),  by  Hugo  von  Trimberg,  a  schoolmaster 
of  Teuerstadt,  a  village  on  the  outskirts  of  Bamberg. 
Hugo  von  Trimberg's  matter-of-fact  spirit  has  little 


MIDDLE    HIGH    GERMAN    PROSE.  55 

patience  with  the  "lies"  set  forth  in  the  epics  of  chivalry, 
but  he  sees  no  falseness  in  the  elaborate  allegory  in 
which  he  himself  inveighs  against  the  sinful  life.  But 
Der  Rentier  has  little  plan  or  form ;  its  author  little 
calling  for  poetry.  .  He  pleases  best  when  he  borrows 
most  freely  from  his  predecessor  and  master,  Freidank. 

Middle  High  German  literature  is  almost  exclusively 
a  literature  in  verse  ;  prose,  at  least  as  a  literary  vehicle, 
is  non-existent,  and  to  find  specimens  of  it  at  all  we  have 
to  turn  mainly  to  sermons  and  law-books.  To  the  former 
category  belong  the  German  tracts  of  David  of  Augsburg, 
who  died  in  1271,  a  preacher  whose  mysticism  fore- 
shadowed coming  developments  in  German  religious 
thought.  His  German  sermons  are  unfortunately  lost. 
But  from  his  contemporary,  Berthold  von  Regensburg,  we 
possess  many  German  sermons.  Berthold  lived  from 
about  1 2 20  to  1272,  wandered  all  over  Germany,  and 
was  unquestionably  the  greatest  popular  preacher  of  the 
German  Middle  Ages.  His  language  has  all  the  qualities 
of  a  good  popular  prose ;  it  is  direct,  dramatic,  sincere, 
and  often  illumined  by  striking  imagery.  Indeed,  it  is 
difficult  to  believe  that  so  excellent  a  prose  style  had  not 
been  preceded  by  a  long  evolution  of  prose  literature. 
Of  less  literary  value  is  the  prose  of  the  law-books  of  the 
age.  The  model  for  all  the  German  legal  codes  was  the 
famous  Sachsenspiegel,  put  together  in  Low  German  about 
1225  by  Eike  von  Repgowe,  a  knight  of  Anhalt ;  and  the 
most  important  imitation  of  it  was  the  South  German 
Schivabenspiegel,  which,  in  its  oldest  form,  dates  from 
about  1260.  Of  more  general  interest  than  these  is  the 
so-called  Lucidarius,  a  kind  of  encyclopaedia  in  the  form 
of  question  and  answer  which  was  compiled  between  1 190 
and  1195,  possibly  at  the  direct  instigation  of  Heinrich 
the  Lion. 

Looking  back  on  the  Middle  High  German  literature 
which  we  have  just  passed  in  review,  it  might  be  said  that 
its  most  conspicuous  characteristic  is  extreme  simplicity  ; 
it  is  practically  only  a  literature  in  verse,  and  it  falls  into 
great  clearly  marked  groups,  distinguished  either  by  the 


56  MINNESANG   AND    DIDACTIC   POETRY. 

rank  and  culture  of  the  individual  poets,  or  by  the  themes 
they  chose  for  their  poetry.  National  epic  and  Court  epic 
exist  side  by  side  with  little  overlapping,  and  such  as 
there  is,  is  not  due  to  any  unclearness  of  definition.  In 
the  same  way  the  lyric,  or  Minnesang,  developed  on  bold 
and  simple  lines,  without  the  confusion  of  forms  which 
renders  a  survey  of  any  other  period  of  German  lyric 
poetry  so  difficult.  Least  sharply  defined  is  the  group 
of  literature  which  has  been  discussed  in  the  latter  part 
of  the  present  chapter,  satire  and  didactic  poetry;  but 
these  may  be  regarded  as  merely  the  prelude  to  a  vast 
literature  which  belongs  essentially  to  the  following  age. 


57 


CHAPTER     VI. 

THE   TRANSITION    FROM    MEDIAEVAL   TO    MODERN 
LITERATURE. 

ABSENCE  of  continuity  is  a  distinguishing  feature  of 
Germany's  literary  as  well  as  her  political  history;  she 
would  appear  to  cling  with  less  tenacity  to  her  poetic 
traditions  than  Italy,  or  France,  or  England,  and  conse- 
quently her  periods  of  transition  are  usually  at  the  same 
time  periods  of  destruction  and  reconstruction,  of  decay  and 
rebirth.  In  the  literature  of  Italy,  Dante,  Ariosto,  Tasso, 
were  the  representatives  of  a  transition  from  mediaevalism 
to  modern  times;  in  France,  the  ideas  of  the  Middle 
Ages  merged,  like  dissolving  views,  into  the  aspirations  of 
the  Renaissance,  and  in  England  a  poet  like  Chaucer  is 
at  the  same  time  a  spokesman  of  medievalism  and  the 
"  father  of  modern  poetry."  In  German  literature,  on 
the  other  hand,  there  is  no  Chaucer,  no  bridge  leading 
from  the  Middle  Ages  to  modern  times.  The  decay, 
which  had  already  set  in  in  the  fourteenth  century,  pro- 
ceeded apace  in  the  fifteenth ;  and  the  fabric  of  medieval 
literature  had  almost  to  be  razed  to  the  ground  before  the 
foundations  of  a  modern  literature  could  be  laid. 

The  subversive  character  of  this  transition  is  partly 
explained  by  the  social  and  political  changes  to  which 
the  German  people  were  in  a  peculiar  degree  exposed. 
The  close  of  the  crusades  hastened  the  decay  of  chivalry ; 
the  invention  of  gunpowder  made  the  knight  of  the  old 
stamp  superfluous,  for  the  issue  of  battles  depended  under 
the  new  conditions  more  on  the  masses  of  foot-soldiers 


58      FROM    MEDIEVAL   TO    MODERN    LITERATURE. 

than  on  the  valour  of  individuals.  As  the  old  aristocracy 
disappeared,  the  middle  classes  rose  in  importance ;  com- 
merce became  a  factor  of  greater  weight  than  it  had  ever 
been  before,  and  the  focus  of  power  in  the  state  was 
removed  from  the  castle  to  the  town.  So  radical  a 
change  in  the  social  order  brought  about  a  complete 
shifting  in  the  literary  centre  of  gravity ;  the  polite  aris- 
tocratic literature  of  the  Middle  Ages  gave  place  to  a 
crude  and  naive  middle  -  class  literature.  The  finer 
graces  of  chivalry  had  no  counterpart  in  the  towns,  where 
life  was  honest  and  straightforward,  but  without  polish 
or  culture ;  the  sense  of  beauty  and  the  feeling  for 
rhythm,  which  had  been  laboriously  attained  by  the 
higher  classes  at  the  opening  of  the  twelfth  century,  dis- 
appeared as  completely  as  if  they  had  never  existed. 
Literature  became  once  more  formless  and  unmusical ; 
it  had,  as  it  were,  to  go  back  to  the  beginnings  again. 
It  is  true,  the  people  still  loved  the  old  stories  of  knightly 
prowess,  just  as  when,  in  earlier  days,  they  sat  at  the  feet 
of  the  noble  singer ;  but  now  that  they  had  themselves 
become  the  tellers  of  these  stories,  the  narrative  alone 
remained  ;  unimaginative  simplicity,  a  jingling  doggrel  or 
lumbering  prose,  not  rarely  a  coarse  humour,  took  the 
place  of  the  refined  art  of  the  past.  In  place  of  the 
unworldly  ideals  of  the  knight,  we  now  find  that  utilitarian 
didacticism  which  seems  inseparable  from  the  middle-class 
mind  in  all  times. 

Almost  as  late  as  the  Reformation,  however,  attempts 
were  made  to  keep  the  traditions  of  mediaeval  romance 
alive;  Wolfram's  Parzival  was,  between  1331  and  1336, 
extended  by  two  Alsatians,  Glaus  Wisse  and  Philipp 
Colin  ;  the  stories  of  the  Trojan  War,  of  Alexander  the 
Great,  and  Charles  the  Great,  were  told  again  in  the 
fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries.  But,  as  time  went  on, 
the  attempts  to  revive  the  old  epic,  such  as  Ulrich  von 
Fiietrer's  Buck  der  Abenteuer,  written  at  the  close  of  the 
latter  century,  showed  how  impossible  it  was  to  bring  the 
Arthurian  ideals  into  harmony  with  the  sober  life  of  the 
German  burgher.  The  Emperor  Maximilian  I.  (1459- 


THE    DECAY    OF    THE    EPIC.  59 

1519),  the  "last  of  the  knights,"  was  at  the  same  time 
the  last  great  patron  and  cultivator  of  mediaeval  literature. 
Two  romances  associated  with  his  name,  Der  Weisskonig 
(1512)  and  Teuerdank  (printed  1517),  have  almost  all  the 
defects  of  the  decadent  epic.  Chivalrous  adventure  is  in 
the  latter  mingled  with  historical  fact  or  extravagant 
allegory ;  the  spacious  idealism  of  the  old  time  is  ousted 
by  irrelevant  moralisings  on  right  and  wrong,  or  by  ludic- 
rously trivial  realism ;  and  the  whole  set  forth  in  clumsy, 
unpoetic  verses,  which,  however,  were  not  composed  by 
the  emperor  himself,  but  by  his  scribe,  Melchior  Pfintzing 
of  Niirnberg.  Prose  was  more  to  the  taste  of  the  age 
than  verse,  and  we  find,  accordingly,  the  stories  of  chivalry 
and  the  national  epics  told  again  and  again  in  this 
medium ;  many  of  them,  indeed,  became  favourite 
"  Volksbiicher "  for  generations  to  come.  But  even 
where  verse  was  employed,  the  technique  of  Middle  High 
German  poetry  had  become  a  lost  art,  and  the  poets  of  the 
age  recast  the  national  epics  in  so-called  "  Knittelverse," 
as  in  the  Dresdener  Heldenbuch  (1472)  and  the  Lied  vom 
hurnen  Seifried. 

For  a  time  it  seemed  as  if  the  loss  of  chivalry  might 
be  compensated  for  in  the  poetry  of  this  age  by  the  poetic 
mysticism  and  allegory  which  filtered  into  European  liter- 
ature from  theological  speculation ;  allegories,  such  as 
that  of  the  chess  figures,  were  as  popular  in  Germany  as 
elsewhere ;  and  Swabia  gave  some  promise  of  a  revival 
of  her  old  poetic  prestige  with  an  allegorical  literature 
that  might  have  taken  its  place  beside  the  Roman  de 
la  Rose.  But  neither  Der  Minne  Lehre  by  Heinzlein  of 
Constance  at  the  close  of  the  thirteenth  century,  nor 
Hermann  von  Sachsenheim's  Des  Spiegels  Abenteuer  and 
Die  Mohrin  in  the  fifteenth  century,  were  followed  by  the 
hoped-for  poetic  renaissance.  The  best  poem  of  this 
class  was,  perhaps,  Die  Jagd,  by  Hadamar  von  Laber, 
a  Bavarian  nobleman  of  the  early  fourteenth  century. 

The  taste  of  the  middle  classes  ran  in  the  direction 
neither  of  chivalrous  virtues  nor  poetic  allegories ;  the 
comic  parody  of  the  epic,  with  grotesquely  realistic  scenes 


60      FROM    MEDIEVAL   TO    MODERN    LITERATURE. 

of  everyday  life,  such  as  Heinrich  Wittenweiler's  Ring, 
from  the  beginning  of  the  fifteenth  century,  was  more  to 
their  taste.  The  short,  comic  anecdote,  however,  enjoyed 
chief  favour.  Figures  like  the  Pfaffe  Amis,  Markolf, 
Neidhart  Fuchs,  round  whom  the  comic  stories  of  the 
earlier  of  these  centuries  collected,  were  still  essen- 
tially mediaeval ;  but  in  Tyl  Eulenspiegel  arose  a  more 
modern  rogue,  an  incarnation  of  the  coarse  mischief,  the 
sly  practical  joking,  of  the  Reformation  age.  Although 
the  oldest  collection  of  Eulenspiegel's  adventures  dates 
from  the  later  fifteenth  century,  no  earlier  version  is  extant 
than  that  which  was  published  at  Strassburg  in  1515. 
Throughout  the  sixteenth  century  volume  after  volume  of 
such  merry  adventures  and  comic  anecdotes  were  issued 
from  the  German  printing-presses.  They  embrace  every 
form  of  "Schwank,"  from  the  coarse  popular  witticisms  of 
the  Austrian  Pfaffe  von  Kalenberg  (ca.  1475),  its  continua- 
tion, the  Histori  Peter  Lewen  (ca.  1550),  and  Eulenspiegel^ 
to  the  Italian  and  oriental  collections  which  found  their 
way  to  Germany  in  the  train  of  the  humanists,  and  semi- 
religious  and  moralising  collections,  such  as  Schimpf  und 
Ernst  (i 552)  by  the  Franciscan  monk,  Johannes  Pauli. 
Apart  from  this  vast  anecdotal  literature,  we  find  a  more 
legitimate  descendant  of  the  mediaeval  "  Spruchdichtung  " 
in  the  verses  of  the  so-called  "  Reimsprecher  "  of  the  four- 
teenth and  fifteenth  centuries,  who  had  skill  in  throw- 
ing off  extempore  verses  in  celebration  of  public  events 
or  in  honour  of  noble  patrons,  or,  as  in  the  case  of  the 
special  group  known  as  "  Wappendichter,"  writing  poetry 
descriptive  of  the  family  arms.  Here  may  be  mentioned 
Peter  Suchenwirth,  an  Austrian  of  the  later  fourteenth 
century,  and  two  Niirnberg  poets,  Hans  Rosenplut  and 
Hans  Folz,  who  flourished  respectively  about  the  middle 
of  the  fifteenth  and  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  centuries. 

Another  mediaeval  form  of  literature  appealed  with  re- 
doubled force  to  this  new  age  of  middle-class  supremacy, 
the  beast  fable.  The  fable  of  ^Esop  had  been  revived  at 
the  beginning  of  our  period  by  Ulrich  Boner,  whose  Edel- 
stein  (ca.  1349),  a  collection  of  fables  on  the  Latin  model, 


"  REINKE   DE   VOS."  6l 

was  one  of  the  first  German  books  to  be  printed ;  and  in 
the  sixteenth  century  Burkard  Waldis  (ca.  1490-1557)  in 
his  Esopus  (1548),  and  Erasmus  Alberus  (1500-53)  in  his 
Buck  von  der  Tugend  und  Weisheit  (1550),  discovered  the 
possibilities  of  the  ^Esopian  fable  as  a  vehicle  for  religious 
polemics.  But  just  as  the  "  Schwank  "  literature  of  this 
age  is  overshadowed  by  the  figure  of  Tyl  Eulenspiegel, 
so  the  beast  fable  is  overshadowed  by  the  most  famous 
work  that  the  Low  German  peoples  have  produced,  the 
romance  of  Reinke  de  Vos.  In  a  quite  special  sense 
this  is  a  product  and  possession  of  the  Low  Germans ; 
the  Reinaert  de  Vos,  which  a  certain  Willem  made  about 
the  middle  of  the  thirteenth  century,  was  Flemish ;  so, 
too,  was  another  version  written  about  1375  ;  and  that  of 
Hinrik  van  Alkmar,  written  in  the  fifteenth  century,  now 
unfortunately  lost,  was  Low  German.  The  edition  we 
know  is  a  Low  Saxon  translation  of  the  last- mentioned 
version;  it  was  printed  at  Liibeck  in  1498.  From  a 
simple  allegory  in  which  King  Lion  holds  his  court  and 
the  rascally  fox  is  condemned  for  his  misdeeds  but 
escapes  punishment  by  his  superior  cunning,  the  story 
grew  into  an  elaborate  satire  on  human  nature,  a  legiti- 
mate precursor  of  the  picaresque  novels  of  the  seventeenth 
century.  Reinke  the  Fox  is  in  disgrace ;  every  animal 
has  some  accusation  to  bring  against  him,  and  Brun  the 
bear  is  despatched  by  King  Lion  to  Malepertus,  to 
summon  Reinke  before  the  court.  But  Brun  is  outwitted 
by  the  Fox's  cunning;  so,  too,  is  Hintze  the  cat.  At 
last,  Grimbart  the  badger  succeeds  in  bringing  the  culprit 
to  justice.  He  is  condemned  to  die,  but  escapes  on 
promising  to  disclose  to  the  king  where  he  will  find 
hidden  treasure.  Meanwhile  Reinke  proposes  to  make 
a  pilgrimage  to  Rome  to  atone  for  his  sins.  Lampe 
the  hare  and  Bellin  the  ram  accompany  him,  but  both 
are  duped,  Lampe  being,  indeed,  served  up  for  the 
supper  of  Reinke  and  his  family.  This  brings  us  to  the 
end  of  the  first  book ;  the  remaining  three  books  are 
much  less  interesting  and  much  more  obviously  didactic  ; 
they  are  clearly  later  excrescences  on  the  original  story. 


62       FROM    MEDIAEVAL    TO    MODERN    LITERATURE. 

Didactic  and  satiric  as  Reinke  de  Vos  was,  the  militant 
antipathies  of  the  age  demanded  a  more  direct  form  of 
satire  for  their  expression,  and,  four  years  earlier,  there 
had  appeared  the  most  famous  German  satire  of  its 
day,  Sebastian  Brant's  Narrenschiff  (1494),  the  proto- 
type of  Barclay's  Ship  of  Fools,  Sebastian  Brant  (1457- 
1521),  who  was  born  and  died  in  Strassburg,  was  a 
humanist  and  a  scholar ;  he  recognised  as  clearly  as  any 
of  his  contemporaries  the  depravity  of  the  time  and  the 
abuses  of  the  religious  life.  But  he  had  little  faith  in  any 
nostrums  of  reform  ;  his  only  hope  for  Germany's  regen- 
eration was  in  a  return  to  the  golden  age  of  mediaeval 
Catholicism.  Thus  his  outlook  was  essentially  negative ; 
he  was  an  iconoclast  rather  than  the  builder  up  of  a  new 
faith,  and,  in  spite  of  himself,  a  forerunner  of  the  Reforma- 
tion. His  Narrenschiff  is  a  collection  of  short,  vigorous 
satires,  written  in  blunt  rhymed  verse,  and  occasionally 
with  an  ostentatious  show  of  learning.  From  fools  of 
crime  and  arrogance  to  rioters  and  spendthrifts,  from 
meddlers  and  busybodies  to  the  fools  that  cling  with 
perverse  self-confidence  to  their  own  ignorance,  Brant 
marshals  before  us  every  type  of  folly  that  the  age  had 
to  show  ;  and  all  of  them  he  assembles  in  a  ship  which 
is  bound  for  the  fools'  paradise,  "  Narragonien."  The  idea 
of  the  ship,  however,  which  is  merely  the  framework  for  a 
collection  of  disconnected  satires,  is  soon  lost  sight  of. 

The  great  movement  of  this  age,  the  passing  of  the 
poetry  of  knighthood  and  the  birth  of  a  literature  of 
the  people,  is  to  be  seen  most  clearly  of  all  in  the 
history  of  the  German  lyric.  Signs  of  degeneration  in 
the  courtly  Minnesang  are  to  be  traced,  as  we  have 
seen,  early  in  the  thirteenth  century;  and  with  every 
new  generation  of  poets  the  bucolic  lyric  of  Neidhart 
gained  on  the  aristocratic  art  of  the  nobility.  As  late 
as  the  beginning  of  the  fifteenth  century  there  were, 
however,  still  poets  bent  on  maintaining  the  old  tradi- 
tions. Hugo  von  Montfort  (1357-1423),  and  Oswald 
von  Wolkenstein  (ca.  1367-1445),  both  natives  of  that 
first  stronghold  of  the  German  Minnesang,  the  moun- 


MINNESANG    AND    MEISTERGESANG.  63 

tainous  'land  that  lies  to  the  east  of  Lake  Constance, 
were  Minnesingers  of  the  old  type ;  but  their  songs 
are  either  echoes  of  the  past,  tinged  with  melancholy, 
or  excel  in  that  technical  cleverness  and  ingenuity  of 
metrical  construction,  which  was  ultimately  to  destroy 
the  sincerity  of  the  lyric.  Thus,  imperceptiblys  the  aristo- 
cratic Minnesang  became  merged  in  the  democratic 
Meistergesang,  a  form  of  poetry  which  was  more  con- 
cerned with  technical  "  correctness "  than  with  truth  of 
sentiment. 

To  no  movement  in  German  poetry  is  the  word 
"  school  "  more  applicable  than  to  the  "  Meister- 
singers."  The  "  Meistergesang "  was  an  artificial  affair 
of  laws  and  rules,  and  could  only  be  learned  in  schools. 
The  Minnesingers  had  been  content  to  express  their 
lyric  emotion  directly  and  simply ;  the  art  of  their  suc- 
cessors lay  in  the  invention  of  complicated  strophic 
forms,  the  ingenious  arrangement  of  words,  and  the 
introduction  of  pedantic  and  often  incongruous  imagery. 
Singing  contests  between  rival  poets  were  the  chief 
events  in  the  Meistersinger  schools.  Such  contests, 
however,  to  judge  from  a  poem  of  the  end  of  the 
thirteenth  century,  the  so  -  called  Wartburgkrieg,  which 
describes  a  contest  of  this  kind  between  the  chief 
Minnesingers  assembled  at  the  court  of  the  Landgraf  Her- 
mann of  Thuringia,  would  appear  to  go  back  to  medi- 
aeval times.  In  the  sixteenth  century  the  aspirant  to 
honours  in  the  Meistersinger  schools  had  first  to  place 
himself  as  "Schuler"  under  the  tuition  of  a  "Meister," 
who  taught  him  the  elaborate  code  of  laws  inscribed 
in  the  "Tabulatur."  This  learned,  the  scholar  then 
became,  according  to  the  Niirnberg  regulations,  a 
"Schulfreund."  The  next  acquirement  was  to  be  able 
to  sing  at  least  four  acknowledged  "tones"  or  melodies, 
which  entitled  the  "Schulfreund"  to  advance  to  the 
rank  of  "Singer."  And  from  "Singer"  he  proceeded 
to  "  Dichter,"  and  from  "  Dichter,"  on  the  invention 
of  a  new  and  original  "tone,"  to  "Meister." 

Needless  to  say,  such  a  reduction  of  the  art  of  poetry 


64      FROM    MEDIAEVAL   TO    MODERN    LITERATURE. 

to  an  artificial  exercise  of  mental  ingenuity  was  not 
favourable  to  the  growth  of  poetic  genius.  The  Meister- 
singer  schools  bore  witness  to  an  awakening  interest 
in  poetry  on  the  part  of  the  "Burger"  of  the  German 
towns,  and  they  provided  the  soil  from  which  sprang 
later  developments,  especially  the  drama ;  but  that  was 
all.  They  produced  neither  real  poetry  nor  real  poets. 
A  number  of  the  later  Minnesingers,  such  as  the  poet 
known  as  the  Marner,  and  Heinrich  von  Miigeln,  stand 
on  the  borderland  between  Minnesang  and  Meister- 
gesang,  while  Heinrich  von  Meissen,  usually  called 
"  Frauenlob,"  who  flourished  about  the  end  of  the 
thirteenth  and  beginning  of  the  fourteenth  century,  may 
be  regarded  as  the  first  prominent  Meistersinger.  His 
verse  is  typical  for  the  whole  school.  Obscure  imagery 
and  scholastic  mysticism,  far-fetched  symbolism  and  in- 
genuity of  strophic  form,  are  more  conspicuous  than 
poetic  spontaneity.  He  is  at  his  best  when  he  sings  the 
praise  of  domestic  virtues  and  the  well-ordered  life.  His 
name  may  have  arisen  from  the  fact  that  his  best-known 
poem  is  in  honour  of  the  Virgin ;  there  is  also  a  legend 
that  he  was  borne  to  his  grave  in  the  cathedral  of  Mainz 
by  women.  In  the  fifteenth  century  the  North  Bavarian, 
Muskatblut,  and  Michael  Beheim  ( I4i6-ca.  1480),  widened 
to  a  certain  extent  the  range  of  the  Meistergesang,  the 
former  by  introducing  religious  themes,  the  latter  by 
making  it  the  vehicle  of  his  experiences  as  a  widely- 
travelled  adventurer ;  yet  when,  in  the  sixteenth  century, 
Hans  Folz  and  his  greater  pupil,  Hans  Sachs,  made 
Niirnberg  the  last  great  centre  of  the  Meistersingers' 
art,  this  form  of  poetry  was  not  essentially  different  from 
what  it  had  been  in  the  time  of  Frauenlob. 

Meanwhile  the  irrepressible  lyric  feeling  of  the  German 
people  in  these  centuries  of  intellectual  awakening  found 
another  outlet;  between  1350  and  1550,  when  artificial 
rules  were  gradually  reducing  the  Meistergesang  to  a 
mechanical  exercise,  the  German  Volkslied  rose  to  heights 
it  had  never  reached  before  and  was  not  to  reach  again. 
In  these  centuries,  as  in  the  seventeenth,  and,  in  fact, 


THE    VOLKSLIED.  65 

in  all  transitional  periods  of  German  literature,  the  lyric 
is  the  most  constant  element,  the  natural  connecting  link 
between  even  the  most  sharply  marked-off  periods.  The 
national  sagas  of  Ermanarich  and  Hildebrand  were  told 
again  now  in  ballad  form,  and  poets  of  the  thirteenth 
century,  such  as  Tannhauser  and  "der  edle  Moringer," 
became  heroes  of  popular  poetry ;  the  story  of  Siegfried 
was,  as  we  have  seen,  recast  in  a  long  epic  ballad.  The 
historical  ballad,  which  is  very  sparingly  represented  in 
the  thirteenth  century,  and  was  practically  a  creation  of 
the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries,  is  the  successor 
to  the  "Spriiche"and  narrative  poems  of  the  mediaeval 
Spielmann.  The  Swiss,  in  particular,  celebrated  in  long 
semi-epic  ballads  their  struggle  against  Charles  the  Bold, 
and  the  Lied  von  der  Sempacher  Schlacht  and  the  Lied  von 
der  Schlacht  bei  Ndfels  are  representative  historical  ballads 
of  the  earlier  period.  This  art  of  throwing  the  great  events 
of  the  day  into  easy  and  attractive  verse  soon  spread 
to  North  Germany,  and  by  the  time  of  the  Reformation 
the  ballad,  one  might  say,  had  become  the  recognised 
newspaper  of  the  time. 

It  is  less  easy  to  point  to  the  mediaeval  analogue  of  the 
popular  love-poetry  of  this  time.  The  nai've  delight  in  the 
coming  of  spring  and  the  interest  with  which  the  unnamed 
popular  poets  follow  the  conflict  between  light  and  dark- 
ness, summer  and  winter,  attuning  these  phenomena  to 
their  own  joys  and  sorrows,  seem  to  take  us  back  to  the 
very  beginnings  of  the  mediaeval  lyric ;  but  the  artless, 
natural  tone  of  these  Volkslieder  is  quite  unhampered  by 
rules,  and  had  been  uninfluenced  by  the  later  develop- 
ment of  the  Minnesang.  We  might  say,  perhaps,  that 
these  songs  represent  a  form  of  lyric  expression  which 
had  never  died  out,  and  had,  all  through  the  Middle  Ages, 
been  handed  down  by  a  merely  oral  tradition  ;  the  love- 
song  of  the  fourteenth  century  was  no  more  a  new  inven- 
tion than  the  historical  ballad.  This  is  further  borne  out 
by  the  close  connection  which  obviously  exists  between 
the  drinking  songs  and  social  songs,  the  light-hearted 
songs  of  student  and  "  landsknecht,"  of  this  age,  and  the 

E 


66        FROM    MEDLEVAL    TO    MODERN    LITERATURE. 

songs   of  the  wandering  scholars  or  Goliards   that  have 
come  down  to  us  from  the  earlier  time. 

In  turn  the  Volkslied  reacted  on  the  religious  Lied  or 
hymn ;  and  a  new  religious  poetry  arose  in  which  the 
Latin  hymns  of  the  Church  were  translated  into  popular 
language,  and  often  altered  beyond  all  recognition.  A 
monk  of  Salzburg,  Hermann  or  Johannes,  had  in  the 
fourteenth  century  popularised  the  Church  poetry  in  this 
way.  The  Volkslieder  were  also  employed  for  religious 
purposes  by  making  them  appear  as  allegories  of  the  spirit- 
ual life,  and  even  by  actually  parodying  them.  Heinrich 
von  Laufenberg,  a  monk  of  Freiburg,  who  died  in  1460, 
was  the  author  of  allegorical  parodies  of  this  kind. 

Dramatic  literature  made  least  satisfactory  progress  in 
the  transition  period,  the  increasing  elaboration  of  the 
church  drama  being,  if  anything,  detrimental  to  its  true  * 
development.  The  beginnings  of  a  more  secular  drama 
are,  however,  to  be  traced  in  the  Low  German  play  of 
Theophilus,  which  goes  back  to  the  fourteenth  century, 
and  in  the  Spiel  von  Fran  Jutten,  written  in  1480  by 
Theodor  Schernberg,  a  priest  of  Miilhausen.  Both  works 
are  forerunners  of  the  Reformation  Faust ;  both  represent 
the  tragedy  of  man's  temptation  by  the  evil  powers. 
Theophilus  sells  his  soul  to  the  devil  for  worldly  dis- 
tinction ;  "  Frau  Jutta  of  England "  is  tempted  by  the 
devil  to  pass  herself  off  as  a  man  ;  she  ultimately  becomes 
Pope,  and  only  escapes  perdition  by  taking  upon  herself 
the  shame  of  the  world. 


67 


CHAPTER     VII. 

HUMANISM    AND    THE    REFORMATION. 

THE  preparation  for  the  Protestant  Reformation  was  two- 
fold, and  may  be  summed  up  in  the  words  mysticism  and 
humanism.  At  the  close  of  the  thirteenth  and  beginning 
of  the  fourteenth  centuries  German  religious  life  was  again 
merged,  as  it  had  been  three  centuries  before,  in  a  wave 
of  religious  fervour  which  now  took  the  form  of  mysticism. 
Meister  Eckhart  (ca.  1260-1327),  the  first  and  the 
greatest  of  the  German  mystics,  preached  the  oneness  of 
the  soul  with  God,  and  gave  German  mysticism  once  and 
for  all  its  guiding  principles  and  ideas.  Eckhart  was 
followed  by  the  fervid,  poetic  Swiss  mystic,  Heinrich  Seuse 
(1295-1366),  and  the  manly  Alsatian  preacher,  Johannes 
Tauler  (ca.  1300-61).  To  the  demand  which  these  men 
made  for  a  purely  personal  faith,  an  intimate  communion 
of  the  soul  with  God,  we  owe  the  first  complete  German 
Bible,  a  translation  of  the  Vulgate,  which  was  published 
at  Strassburg  in  1466.  What  Tauler  was  to  the  fourteenth 
century,  another  Alsatian,  Johann  Geiler  of  Kaisersberg 
(1445-1510),  was  to  the  fifteenth;  he,  too,  was  a  mystic, 
but  a  mystic  who  had  studied  in  the  school  of  the 
humanists.  He  accepted  the  tenets  of  mysticism,  but  he 
interpreted  them  in  an  essentially  practical  way  ;  he  de- 
manded the  abolition  of  abuses  within  the  church  as 
well  as  a  deepening  of  the  spiritual  life  of  the  individual. 
And,  like  his  friend  Brant,  he  had  recourse  to  that  fav- 
ourite weapon  of  the  humanists,  satire. 

Humanism,  the  other  factor  of  the  new  movement,  takes 


68  HUMANISM   AND    THE    REFORMATION. 

its  beginning,  as  far  as  Germany  was  concerned,  from  the 
founding  of  the  University  of  Prague  in  1348.  It  first 
made  itself  felt  in  literature  by  introducing  into  Germany 
the  fruits  of  the  Italian  Renaissance ;  Enea  Silvio,  Poggio, 
Petrarch,  Boccaccio,  were  translated  ;  the  classics  appeared 
in  German,  notably  Plautus  and  Terence ;  the  literary 
horizon  of  northern  Europe  was  rapidly  widened.  But 
the  original  literature  of  the  German  humanists  remained 
Latin  in  language  and  spirit ;  and  the  fact  that  many  of 
them,  such  as  Jakob  Wimpfeling  (1450-1528),  interested 
themselves  in  the  history  of  their  native  land,  atoned  only 
in  a  very  small  degree  for  the  un- German  character  of 
their  books  and  ideas.  One  may  even  trace  back  to  the 
contempt  of  the  early  German  humanists  for  their  mother- 
tongue  that  prejudice  in  favour  of  Latin,  and  even  French, 
which  did  not  die  out  in  Germany  until  late  in  the 
eighteenth  century. 

But,  whether  Latin  or  German,  humanism  was  the 
great  destructive  force  which  shook  the  catholic  world  to 
its  foundations,  and  prepared  the  way  for  Luther.  On  the 
threshold  of  the  Reformation  stand  two  humanists, 
Desiderius  Erasmus  of  Rotterdam  (1467-1536)  and 
Johannes  Reuchlin  of  Pforzheim  (1455-1522),  who 
fought  with  every  weapon  at  their  command  against  the 
retrograde  traditions  of  the  mediaeval  church.  The  first 
of  these,  author  of  the  world-famous  books,  the  En- 
chiridion militis  christiani  ("  Manual  of  the  Christian 
Soldier,"  1509),  and  the  Morice  Encomium  ("Praise  of 
Folly,"  1509),  laid,  with  his  edition  of  the  Greek  Testa- 
ment, the  basis  for  a  direct  knowledge  of  the  Bible ;  and 
Reuchlin  became  involved  in  one  of  the  bitterest  of  pre- 
Reformation  conflicts  by  the  publication  of  a  Hebrew 
Grammar.  The  humanists  warmly  espoused  Reuchlin's 
cause;  in  1514  he  was  able  to  publish  their  testimony 
to  him  in  the  form  of  Epistolce  clarorum  virorum ;  and 
in  the  following  years,  1515-17,  appeared  what  was 
ostensibly  a  retort  to  these  letters,  the  Epistolce  obscurorum 
virorum.  At  first  the  church  party  was  gratified  by  this 
vindication  of  their  standpoint,  but  it  soon  became  obvious 


MARTIN    LUTHER.  69 

that  these  letters  were  really  an  ingenious  and,  by  its  very 
insidiousness,  powerful  satire  on  Reuchlin's  opponents. 
The  authorship  of  the  letters  is  still  uncertain,  Johannes 
Jager  (Crotus  Rubianus)  of  Dornheim  being  usually  men- 
tioned as  having  had  the  chief  share  in  them ;  but,  who- 
ever may  have  written  them,  the  Epistola  obscurorum 
•uirorum  were  an  effective  prelude  to  the  Reformation. 

Like  all  great  movements,  the  Reformation  was  ulti- 
mately the  achievement  of  a  single  mind,  which  synthesised 
and  gave  expression  to  the  vague  aspirations  of  the  age.  The 
two  streams  of  mysticism  and  humanism  converged  and 
united  in  Martin  Luther.  Born  at  Eisleben  in  Thuringia 
on  November  10,  1483,  Luther  had  in  his  youth  come 
under  both  influences,  and  in  1512,  after  a  journey  to 
Rome,  he  was  made  Doctor  of  Theology  in  Wittenberg ; 
only  five  years  later,  on  October  31,  1517,  he  nailed  on 
the  door  of  the  Schlosskirche  of  that  town  his  ninety-five 
Thesen  wider  den  Ablass.  The  humanists  had  long  in- 
veighed against  the  abuse  of  indulgences,  but  Luther 
was  the  first  to  make  it  a  vital  question  of  the  main- 
tenance of  the  Christian  church.  And  once  a  beginning 
was  made,  the  principles  of  the  protestant  Reformation 
took  miraculously  rapid  shape  in  Luther's  mind.  In  less 
than  three  years,  in  1520,  he  gave  Germany  the  three  great 
documents  of  protestantism,  An  den  Christlichen  Adel 
deutscher  Nation,  De  captivitate  Babylonica  ecclesia  (in 
Latin),  and  Von  der  Freiheit  eines  Christenmenschen. 
The  Bible,  and  the  Bible  alone,  he  demanded,  must  be  the 
law  to  every  Christian  ;  supremacy  in  German  lands  must  lie 
with  the  German  Emperor  and  not  with  the  Pope ;  above 
all,  the  church  must  be  swept  clean  of  its  hypocrisies 
and  abuses.  He  will  have  no  more  vows  and  no  monastic 
prisons  ;  no  more  festivals  for  saints,  no  pious  pilgrimages  ; 
the  inquisition  must  be  abolished.  He  also  demanded 
the  emancipation  of  the  schools  from  the  fetters  of 
mediaeval  scholasticism,  and  made  spacious  plans  for  the 
reform  of  German  education. 

In  the  castle  of  the  Wartburg,  where  Luther  was  con- 
cealed, a  willing  prisoner,  until  the  storms  evoked  by  his 


70  HUMANISM    AND    THE    REFORMATION. 

actions  had  subsided  a  little,  he  began  his  translation  of 
the  Bible;  the  New  Testament  appeared  in  1522,  the 
whole  Bible  in  1534.  In  1522  he  returned  to  Witten- 
berg, and  in  1525  married  a  former  nun,  Katharina  von 
Bora.  His  death  took  place  in  1546  during  a  visit  to  his 
native  town. 

Like  the  English  Bible,  Luther's  Bible  is  in  the  best 
sense  a  literary  monument ;  it  is  a  "Volksbuch,"  written 
in  the  pithy,  vivid  language  of  the  German  people,  and 
represents,  better  than  any  other  book  of  its  age,  the 
triumph  of  the  new  middle-class  literature  over  the  aristo- 
cratic poetry  of  the  Middle  High  German  period.  In 
respect  of  language  it  was  no  less  important ;  for  Luther 
was  careful  to  choose  for  the  medium  of  his  translation  a 
dialect — that  of  Meissen  and  the  Saxon  official  language 
—  which  should  be  comprehensible  to  the  greatest 
possible  numbers  of  the  nation,  and  in  this  way  took 
the  first  and  greatest  step  towards  the  literary  unification 
of  Germany. 

Luther  not  only  gave  Germany  her  Bible,  but  also  her 
hymn-book ;  his  Geistliche  Lieder,  of  which  the  first 
collection  appeared  in  1524,  form  the  basis  of  the 
protestant  hymnal.  As  in  his  Bible  he  had  taken  the 
language  of  "  the  common  German  man  "  as  his  model, 
so  here  he  turns  to  the  German  Volkslied.  Simplicity 
and  pious  earnestness,  above  all,  the  avoidance  of  dog- 
matism and  of  that  over-subtlety  which  crept  into  German 
religious  poetry  later,  are  the  characteristics  of  his  hymns. 
The  best  idea  of  Luther's  personality  is  to  be  obtained 
from  his  Tischreden,  which  were  first  collected  in  1566; 
these  give  an  interesting  glimpse  into  the  mind  of  the 
reformer,  and  reveal  a  strange  combination  of  childlike 
simplicity  and  dogged,  unbending  will  which  shrank 
before  nothing.  His  unreadiness  to  enter  into  any 
compromise,  even  with  those  who  wished  him  and  his 
cause  well,  may  often  seem  to  us  tactless ;  but  we 
have  to  admit  that  it  was  just  this  ruthless  determin- 
ation of  purpose  and  callous  unreasonableness  that  en- 


ULRICH    VON    HUTTEN  J    SATIRE.  71 

abled  Luther  to  achieve  the  great  work  which  was  put 
on  his  shoulders. 

Taken  as  a  whole,  the  protestant  Reformation  had  little 
to  do  directly  with  literature  ;  the  Reformers  were  not 
literary  men.  Hardly  any  of  them,  indeed,  except  Luther 
himself,  left  his  mark  on  literature ;  Zwingli,  Hus,  even 
Melanchthon  (Philipp  Schwarzerd,  1497-1560),  the 
"prseceptor  Germanise,"  have  no  claim  to  a  place  in  the 
present  history.  In  one  of  Luther's  contemporaries,  how- 
ever, the  Franconian  knight  Ulrich  von  Hutten  (1488- 
1523),  the  spirit  of  the  Reformation  joins  hands  with 
humanism,  and  the  result  has  more  immediate  bearing 
on  literature.  At  the  same  time,  Ulrich  von  Hutten's 
writings,  whether  in  Latin  or  in  the  vernacular,  belong 
rather  to  the  literature  of  humanism  than  of  the  Re- 
formation. The  cause  of  protestantism  no  doubt 
suffered  from  its  lack  of  effective  satirists.  Men  like 
Erasmus  Alberus  (ca.  1500-53),  author  of  .Der  Barfiisser 
Monch  Eulenspiegel  und  Alcoran  (1542),  and  of  the 
collection  of  fables,  Das  Buch  von  dcr  lugend  und 
Weisheit  (1550),  or  the  Swiss,  Niklaus  Manuel  (1484- 
1536),  who  wrote  dramatic  satires,  sink  into  insignifi- 
cance compared  with  the  catholic  priest,  Thomas  Murner 
(1475-1537),  the  most  unscrupulous  satirist  in  the  whole 
range  of  German  literature. 

A  Franciscan  monk  of  Strassburg,  Murner  had  been 
brought  up  in  the  school  of  humanism,  and  had  learned 
both  from  Brant  and  Geiler.  His  earlier  satires,  Die 
Narrenbeschworung  and  Die  Schelmenzunft  (1512),  show 
unmistakably  the  influence  of  the  Narrenschiff,  although 
both  are  on  a  grosser  plane.  Die  Miihle  von  Schimndels- 
heim  (1515)  and  Die  Geuchmat  ("the  fools'  meadow," 
1519)  are  still  coarser  and  more  scathing,  while  Vom 
grossen  lutherischen  Narren  (1522)  is  most  virulent  and 
bitter  of  all.  This  last  is  a  personal  satire  on  the 
reformer,  and  Murner  shrinks  before  nothing  that  the 
scurrility  and  brutality  of  the  age  could  invent.  That 
the  Reformation  withstood  such  an  attack  is  one  of  the 


72  HUMANISM    AND    THE    REFORMATION. 

tributes  to  its  justification  and  necessity.  The  impression 
which  Murner  makes  on  us  is  that  of  an  absolutely  nega- 
tive nature ;  he  was  an  uncompromising  pessimist  who 
saw  good  in  nothing.  The  new  order  of  things  which  the 
Reformation  promised  was  utterly  repugnant  to  him  ;  his 
only  hope  was  in  a  return  to  the  ideals  of  mediaeval 
Christianity,  and  when  this  hope  was  destroyed,  he  turned 
and  vented  his  resentment  on  Luther  himself. 

Barren  as  the  Reformation  was  in  literary  monu- 
ments outside  of  Luther's  Bible,  it  exerted  a  great  and 
inspiring  influence  on  the  literature  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury. Above  all,  the  drama  responded  to  its  stimulus. 
Towards  the  end  of  the  fifteenth  century  a  new  type  of 
play  arose,  which  provided  the  outlet,  hitherto  missing, 
for  the  nation's  dramatic  instincts.  This  was  the  "  Fast- 
nachtsspiel,"  or  shrove-tide  play,  a  kind  of  dramatised, 
or  merely  dialoguised,  "  Schwank,"  which  had  taken  form 
in  Niirnberg  in  the  hands  of  Hans  Rosenpliit  and  Hans 
Folz,  two  writers  who  have  already  been  mentioned.  In 
itself  the  "  Fastnachtsspiel"  was  not  broad  enough  to 
form  the  basis  of  a  national  drama ;  but  it  was  supple- 
mented by  and  learned  from  the  Latin  School  comedy 
of  the  humanists ;  and  the  German  humanists,  begin- 
ning with  Wimpfeling,  who  wrote  his  Stylpho  in  1470, 
did  not  stand  behind  their  Italian  colleagues  in  the 
cultivation  of  the  drama.  Thus  between  indigenous 
"  Fastnachtsspiel "  and  Latin  comedy,  the  conditions  were 
exceedingly  favourable  for  the  development  of  German 
comedy  at  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century ;  and 
the  Reformation,  which  was  ready  to  employ  the  drama 
in  the  service  of  its  controversies,  provided  the  leaven  of 
ideas. 

The  value  of  the  drama  as  a  factor  in  the  spread  of  the 
Reformation  was  first  recognised  in  Switzerland,  where, 
even  before  Luther's  decisive  step  had  been  taken,  Pam- 
philus  Gengenbach,  a  native  of  Niirnberg,  had  in  his 
Die  Gonchmat  (1516)  and  Der  Nollhart  (1517),  written 
"  Fastnachtsspiele  "  in  the  interests  of  moral  and  religious 
reform.  But  the  chief  representation  of  the  early  Swiss 


THE    RISE    OF    THE    DRAMA.  73 

protestant  comedy  was  Niklaus  Manuel  (1484-1536),  who 
has  already  been  mentioned  as  the  most  powerful  satirist 
on  the  protestant  side.  Manuel  was  a  native  of  Bern, 
and  had  made  a  name  for  himself  both  as  a  soldier  and  a 
painter.  His  "  Fastnachtsspiele  "  or  dramatic  dialogues — 
for  they  are  little  more — Vom  Papst  und  seiner  Priest- 
schaft  (1522),  Der  Ablasskramer  (1525),  Barbali  (1526), 
and  most  trenchant  of  all,  Von  der  Messe  Krankheit  und 
ihrem  letzten  Willen  (1528),  are,  in  the  first  instance, 
satires ;  but  Manuel  had  no  mean  gifts  of  dramatic  char- 
acterisation, and  under  more  favourable  conditions  might 
have  helped  to  create  a  genuine  national  drama. 

Outside  Switzerland  the  influence  of  the  Latin  comedy 
was  more  conspicuous.  The  fable-writer  Burkard  Waldis 
produced  in  1527  a  play  in  Low  German,  Parabell  vam 
vorlorn  Sohn,  which  has  clearly  benefited  by  the  in- 
fluence of  the  Latin  drama ;  so,  too,  has  the  Susanna 
(produced  at  Basel  in  1532)  of  Sixt  Birck  (1500-54),  a 
schoolmaster  of  Augsburg.  Better,  however,  than  Birck's 
version  of  this,  the  most  popular  dramatic  theme  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  was  another  by  Paul  Rebhun,  a  Saxon 
pastor,  who  lived  from  about  1500  to  1546.  Rebhun's 
Susanna  (1535),  as  well  as  his  less  successful  Hochzeit 
zu  Cana  (1538),  are  attempts  to  adapt  to  German  require- 
ments the  Latin  metres  which  the  humanists  were  fond  of 
experimenting  with.  But  apart  from  its  vagaries  in  out- 
ward form,  Rebhun's  work  shows  how  much  the  German 
comedy  was  able  to  learn,  in  the  matter  of  construction, 
from  the  Latin ;  his  Susanna  is  the  best  German  play  of 
the  sixteenth  century. 

The  School  comedy  itself  could  point  to  two  masters 
in  Germany,  —  Thomas  Kirchmayer,  better  known  by 
his  Latin  name,  Naogeorgus  (1511-63),  the  author  of 
many  polemical  Latin  dramas,  of  which  the  best  are 
Pammachius  (1538)  and  Mercator  (1540) ;  and  the  gifted 
Swabian  poet,  Philipp  Nikodemus  Frischlin  (1547-90). 
Frischlin  was  for  a  time  Professor  of  Poetry  in  Tubingen, 
but  his  unbridled  satirical  tongue  got  him  into  political 
trouble,  and  the  Duke  of  Wiirtemberg  imprisoned  him 


74  HUMANISM    AND    THE    REFORMATION. 

in  the  castle  of  Hohenurach.  This  was  in  1590,  and  a 
few  months  later  he  lost  his  life  in  attempting  to  escape. 
Frischlin's  plays  are  not  all,  like  his  Rebecca  (1576) 
and  Susanna  (1577),  in  Latin;  he  wrote  in  the  ver- 
nacular a  historical  comedy,  Frau  Wendelgard  (1579), 
the  heroine  of  which  is  the  daughter  of  Heinrich  I.,  and 
he  planned  a  series  of  Biblical  dramas,  to  which  belong 
Ruth  and  Die  Hochzeit  zu  Cana.  Frischlin  is  at  its 
best  when  he  is  opposing  abuses  or  fighting  for  ideas ; 
in  his  Priscianus  vapulans  (1578)  he  satirises  the  bar- 
barous Latin  of  the  Middle  Ages,  in  Julius  Cczsar 
Redivivus  (1584)  he  brings  Caesar  back  to  earth  to 
wonder  at  the  inventions  of  gunpowder  and  printing,  and 
in  Phasma  (1580)  he  ventures  on  the  dangerous  ground 
of  religious  controversy  and  sectarian  quarrels.  On  the 
whole,  these  plays  mark  the  high  -  water  level  of  the 
German  humanistic  drama ;  Frischlin  was,  no  doubt,  one 
of  the  most  gifted  German  dramatists  of  his  century ;  but 
in  his  outlook  on  life  he  was  too  exclusively  a  humanist 
to  influence  very  deeply  the  vernacular  literature. 

The  representative  German  poet  and  dramatist  of  the 
sixteenth  century  is  the  cobbler  of  Niirnberg,  Hans  Sachs, 
the  most  complete  embodiment  of  the  "  biirgerliche  "  spirit 
of  the  age.  Born  in  1494,  he  enjoyed  a  fairly  good  edu- 
cation and,  under  the  guidance  of  the  Niirnberg  Meister- 
singer  schools,  worked  his  way  up  to  the  rank  of  a  master 
in  the  art  of  poetry.  For  more  than  fifty  years  he  was 
the  acknowledged  leader  of  the  Niirnberg  Meistergesang, 
and  has  left  behind  him  an  enormous  quantity  of  verse. 
His  own  inventory,  made  in  1567,  enumerates  no  less 
than  4275  Meistergesange  and  1773  Spruchgedichte,  of 
which  more  than  two  hundred  were  dramas.  He  died  in 
1576. 

Hans  Sachs  made  his  reputation  in  the  first  instance 
by  taking  advantage  of  the  new  ideals  in  literature  to 
widen  the  sphere  of  the  German  Meistersinger  poetry  ; 
he  adapted  to  German  needs  the  treasures  of  the 
Italian  Renaissance  which  the  humanists  were  rapidly 
making  common  European  property.  In  the  second 


HANS    SACHS.  75 

place,  he  threw  in  his  lot  at  an  early  date  with  the 
"  Wittembergische  Nachtigall,"  Luther.  His  "  Meister- 
lieder,"  his  religious  poetry,  his  parables  and  fables,  are 
as  good  as  any  the  sixteenth  century  produced ;  but 
while  many  of  his  contemporaries  showed  a  strong  satiric 
bias,  while  others  had  the  power  of  rising  above  their 
own  world  and  seeing  things  from  a  more  universal  stand- 
point, Sachs  remained  from  first  to  last  a  simple  story- 
teller. He  rarely  said  anything  in  verse  which  might  not 
as  easily  have  been  said  in  prose,  and  he  wrote  entirely 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  Niirnberg  "Burger."  He 
reflected  the  latter's  outlook  on  life,  and  was  content  to 
chronicle  faithfully  and  to  describe  the  civic  life  around 
him,  townspeople  and  peasants,  monks  and  artisans, 
exactly  as  he  saw  them.  He  is  the  versatile  spokesman 
of  his  time  and  people. 

But  the  want  of  higher  poetic  thoughts  and  impulses 
becomes  a  virtue  in  Sachs's  verse-anecdotes  and  stories  ; 
his  unvarnished  narrative  adds  nothing  and  subtracts 
nothing,  and  in  every  line  is  apparent  his  delight  in  the 
mere  telling  of  the  story.  It  is  as  a  dramatist,  however, 
that  he  has  left  the  most  abiding  mark  on  his  time.  In 
his  hands  the  "  Fastnachtsspiel,"  which  earlier  poets  had 
employed  only  as  a  means  to  satiric  or  controversial 
ends,  receives  its  final  stamp  ;  it  becomes  a  humorous 
"  Schwank "  thrown  into  dramatic  dialogue.  The  best 
of  Sachs's  "  Fastnachtsspiele,"  such  as  Der  fahrende 
Schiiler  im  Paradies  (1550),  Frau  Wahrheit  will  niemand 
herbergen  (1550),  Das  heisse  Eisen  (1551),  and  Der  Bauer 
im  Fegefeuer  (1552),  show  that  he  was  not  only  able  to 
tell  an  interesting  story  in  dialogue,  but  could  also  create 
genuinely  dramatic  figures.  In  the  same  spirit  Hans 
Sachs  wrote  comedies  and  tragedies,  although  his  lack  of 
understanding  for  the  laws  of  dramatic  construction  placed 
these  more  ambitious  efforts  at  a  disadvantage.  From 
the  humanist  dramatists,  it  is  true,  he  had  borrowed  the 
method  of  dividing  his  plays  into  "Actus,"  and  of  assisting 
the  movement  of  the  play  by  means  of  an  "  Ehrenhold  " 
or  herald  :  but  his  dramas  remain,  after  all,  only  stories 


76  HUMANISM    AND    THE    REFORMATION. 

in  dialogue  form.  His  range  of  subjects  was  extraordin- 
arily wide ;  they  are  taken  from  the  Bible,  the  Greek 
and  Latin  classics,  from  the  old  German  sagas,  as  well 
as  from  the  Italian  novelists  and  contemporary  German 
collections  of  "  Schwanke." 

A  more  powerful  and  original  writer  than  Sachs  was 
Johann  Fischart  (ca.  1550-90),  perhaps,  indeed,  the  most 
manly  personality  in  the  German  literature  of  the  Refor- 
mation period.  Fischart  was  born  about  the  middle  of 
the  sixteenth  century,  probably  in  Strassburg,  and  was 
much  more  deeply  immersed  in  the  stream  of  humanism 
than  the  Niirnberg  shoemaker.  He  had  been  brought 
up  by  Kaspar  Scheidt,  the  learned  translator  of  Grobianus 
(1549),  a  vigorous  Latin  satire  by  F.  Dedekind  (ca. 
1525-98)  on  the  coarseness  and  brutality  of  the  age; 
and  he  had  travelled  widely.  Like  Hans  Sachs,  he  began 
as  a  champion  of  the  Reformation,  but  the  satires  on  the 
catholics,  which  he  adapted  from  French  and  Dutch 
originals  —  Der  Bienenkorb  des  heiligen  romischen  Im- 
menschwarms  (1579)  and  Das  Jesuiterhiitlein  (1580) — 
are  much  more  definite  in  their  aims  than  the  com- 
paratively ineffectual  satire  that  accompanied  the  Refor- 
mation movement  in  its  early  stages.  Fischart's 
Philosophisches  Ehezuchtbiichlein  (1578),  the  most  pleasing 
of  all  his  prose  writings,  shows  how  close  the  ties  were 
that  bound  him  to  the  humanists ;  and  in  his  best 
poem,  Das  glitckhafte  Schiff  von  Zurich  (1576),  he  had 
learned  a  lesson  in  form  from  the  classic  masterpieces 
which  the  Renaissance  had  made  popular.  This,  the  best 
German  poem  of  the  whole  sixteenth  century,  tells  how 
in  the  summer  of  1576  a  number  of  Zurich  citizens  made 
in  a  single  day  the  voyage  from  Zurich  to  Strassburg  in 
order  to  take  part  in  a  shooting  festival.  The  bonds  of 
neighbourly  feeling  are  symbolised  by  a  basin  of  millet 
porridge,  which,  cooked  in  the  morning  before  the  party 
leaves  Zurich,  still  retains  its  warmth  when  their  vessel 
reaches  Strassburg  at  nightfall. 

While  Sachs  merely  skimmed  the  surface  of  his  age, 
Fischart    plunged    deep  into    its    social    and    intellectual 


JOHANN    FISCHART.  77 

movements,  regardless  of  their  coarseness  or  brutality. 
That  broad  virility,  which  in  Murner  shrank  at  nothing, 
is  revived  again,  this  time  on  the  protestant  side,  by 
Fischart.  He  had  not  studied  under  the  translator  of 
the  Grobianus  for  nothing,  and  his  epic  Floh  ffatz, 
Weiber  Tratz  (1573)  falls  little  short  of  Murner's  satires 
in  its  coarseness.  But  the  fact  that  Fischart  lived  a 
generation  later  than  his  catholic  predecessor  enabled 
him  to  draw  more  easily  on  the  later  Renaissance  litera- 
tures, and  in  Rabelais  he  found  a  congenial  master. 
Fischart's  masterpiece  is  his  translation  or  adaptation 
of  the  first  book  of  Rabelais's  comic  romance,  which 
appeared  in  German  under  the  extraordinary  title, 
Affenteurlich  naupengeheurliche  Geschichtklitterung  vom 
Leben,  Raten  und  Taten  der  Helden  und  Herren 
Grandgusier,  Gargantua  und  Pantagruel  (1575).  Rabe- 
lais is  here  translated  as  no  writer  has  ever  been 
translated  before  or  since.  A  translation,  indeed,  it  is 
impossible  to  call  Fischart's  book ;  it  is  an  adaptation 
which  has  swollen  to  three  times  the  size  of  the  orig- 
inal ;  a  clumsy,  unwieldy  book,  the  humour  of  which 
consists  in  the  heaping  up  of  incongruous  epithets,  a 
book  which  forfeits  all  claim  on  our  interest  by  its  absurd 
exaggerations  and  its  insufferable  formlessness.  And  yet, 
in  spite  of  its  unpromising  and  repellent  exterior,  or  rather 
by  virtue  of  it,  Fischart's  Geschichtklitterung  reflects  the 
intellectual  temper  of  its  time ;  it  is  as  completely  German 
as  its  original  is  French,  and  a  characteristic  product  of 
the  dominant  factors  in  the  intellectual  life  of  the  six- 
teenth century,  humanism  and  protestantism. 

The  new  spirit  which  expressed  itself  unmistakably  in 
the  writings  of  Fischart,  also  found  a  congenial  outlet  in 
the  later  developments  of  the  "  Schwank."  Jorg  Wickram 
(died  ca.  1560),  a  Meistersinger  of  Colmar,  to  whose  longer 
novels  we  shall  return  in  a  later  chapter,  produced  in  his 
Rollwagenbuchlein  (1555) — that  is,  "  Biichlein  "  for  the 
use  of  travellers  in  the  diligence  or  "  Rollwagen " — an 
excellent  popular  collection  of  such  anecdotes,  which  was 
speedily  followed  by  a  large  number  of  imitations,  such  as 


78  HUMANISM    AND    THE    REFORMATION. 

M.  Montanus's  Wegkiirzer  (1557),  M.  Lindener's  Rast- 
biichlein  (1558),  and  H.  W.  Kirchhoffs  Wendunmut(\^^). 
These  were  the  legitimate  successors  of  the  long  line  of 
collections  of  "Schwanke"  which  extended  unbroken  from 
the  Middle  Ages  to  the  Reformation.  Fischart's  satires  on 
the  catholics  found  successors  in  Der  treue  Eckart  (1588) 
and  Die  lautere  Wahrheit  (1585)  by  Bartholomaus 
Ringwaldt  (ca.  1530-99),  and  the  beast  epic  was 
brought  into  the  service  of  the  Reformation  by  Georg 
Rollenhagen  (1542-1609),  author  of  the  Froschmauseler 
(1595),  a  modernised  version  of  the  Greek  "  battle  of  the 
frogs  and  mice."  In  this  century,  too,  the  "  Volksbuch  " 
became,  like  the  Volkslied,  a  vehicle  of  expression  for 
the  nation's  aspirations;  and  in  one  of  these  "Volks- 
bucher,"  the  Historia  von  D.  Johann  Fausten,  published 
at  Frankfort-on-the-Main  in  1587,  we  rind  an  illustra- 
tion of  how  the  German  people  of  the  sixteenth  century 
interpreted  the  intellectual  liberation  which  protestantism 
conferred  on  them.  Like  so  many  dreamers  in  the 
history  of  his  time,  the  Faust  of  the  "  Volksbuch " 
hopes  to  obtain  by  means  of  alchemy,  astrology,  and 
magic,  rest  from  the  longings  that  harass  him ;  he 
makes  a  pact  with  the  devil,  who  opens  up  to  him  new 
worlds  of  unlimited  enjoyment  and  unlimited  knowledge  ; 
he  travels  far  and  wide,  to  Italy  and  the  East,  and  con- 
jures up  the  most  beautiful  woman  of  all  time,  Helen  of 
Troy,  until  at  last  the  twenty-four  years  for  which  he 
had  stipulated  come  to  an  end  and  he  is  carried  off 
in  triumph  to  hell.  Such  is  the  earliest  form  in  which 
the  immortal  story  appears, — a  story  which,  two  centuries 
later,  Goethe  made  use  of  to  show  that  human  aspiration, 
human  longings  and  ambitions  are  not,  as  the  sixteenth 
century  believed,  to  be  rewarded  with  eternal  damnation, 
but  are  the  most  precious  attributes  of  our  race. 


79 


CHAPTER    VIII. 

THE    RENAISSANCE    IN    GERMANY. 

THE  seventeenth  century,  contrasted  with  this  epoch  in 
other  lands,  is  a  dark  age  in  Germany's  intellectual 
history.  Her  literature,  it  is  true,  is  voluminous  enough, 
but  it  has  no  root  in  the  soil,  and  consists  for  the  most 
part  of  artificial  and  ill-adapted  imitations  of  foreign 
models.  Thus  the  century  which  in  England  was  rung 
in  by  Shakespeare  and  his  great  contemporaries  and 
closed  with  Milton  and  Dryden,  the  century  of  Ariosto 
and  Tasso,  of  Cervantes,  Calder6n,  and  Lope  de  Vega, 
the  age  of  Louis  XIV.,  is  mainly  a  period  of  negation 
in  Germany. 

For  this  there  were  two  reasons,  one  political,  the 
other  inherent  in  the  conditions  of  German  literary 
development.  The  seventeenth  century  was  the  cen- 
tury of  the  Thirty  Years'  War;  from  1618  to  1648, 
that  terrible  struggle  between  the  two  great  spiritual 
powers  in  Europe,  Catholicism  and  protestantism,  de- 
vastated German  lands,  as  no  lands  before  or  since 
in  the  history  of  civilised  peoples  have  been  devas- 
tated. The  population  of  Germany  was  reduced  to 
one-fourth  of  what  it  had  been  when  the  war  began, 
and  from  comparative  affluence  the  country  was  brought 
to  the  extremes  of  poverty.  Worst  of  all,  the  uncertainty 
of  life  and  property,  and  the  desolation  which  the  armies 
left  in  their  train,  demoralised  the  nation.  This  alone 
was  sufficient  to  destroy  any  literature  that  drew  its 
vitality  from  the  national  life.  There  was,  however, 


8o  THE    RENAISSANCE    IN    GERMANY. 

another  and  more  subtle  reason  for  the  intellectual  bank- 
ruptcy of  Germany  in  the  seventeenth  century.  The 
literature  which  the  Reformation  inaugurated  and  in- 
spired had  come  to  a  natural  end ;  it  had  been,  in 
the  best  sense,  popular  and  indigenous ;  but,  like  all 
purely  indigenous  literatures,  it  voiced  the  mood  and 
aspirations  of  a  very  definite  age;  it  was  incapable  of 
adapting  itself  to  new  conditions,  and  not  strong  enough 
to  maintain  its  existence  against  the  powerful  influence 
of  neighbouring  literatures.  Thus,  even  had  the  Thirty 
Years'  War  not  checked  all  healthy  development,  the 
literary  movement  of  the  seventeenth  century  in  Germany 
would  have  had  to  make  a  fresh  start ;  it  could  not 
merely  have  carried  on  the  traditions  of  the  Reforma- 
tion period. 

A  new  stimulus  was  necessary,  and  that  stimulus  came 
from  without.  At  the  close  of  the  sixteenth  century 
there  was  an  attempt  to  revive  the  moribund  Reform- 
ation drama  by  engrafting  upon  it  the  technical  achieve- 
ments of  the  Elizabethan  drama.  About  this  time 
English  actors,  taking  advantage  of  the  continental  re- 
putation of  the  English  stage,  visited  Germany  and 
gave  performances  in  most  of  the  larger  towns ;  their 
repertory  consisted  of  the  popular  English  plays  of 
the  day,  which  were  often  badly  mutilated  or  even  re- 
duced to  mere  theatrical  skeletons  of  sensational  incident 
interspersed  with  clowning.  The  entertainments  proved, 
however,  popular,  and  soon  German  troupes,  to  which 
an  English  clown  was  occasionally  attached,  took,  as 
"  Englische  Komodianten,"  the  place  of  the  foreign  rivals. 
Two  German  dramatists,  Jakob  Ayrer  (1543-1605),  a 
notary  of  Nurnberg,  and  Heinrich  Julius,  Duke  of 
Brunswick  (1564-1613),  were  quick  to  realise  how  the 
Reformation  drama  could  learn  from  England,  and  wrote 
plays  which  combined  the  old  form  with  the  technical 
improvements  and  varied  attractions  of  these  adaptations 
from  the  English.  Unfortunately,  however,  these  hope- 
ful beginnings  were  blotted  out  by  the  war,  which  was 
naturally  more  disastrous  to  the  drama  than  to  any  other 


HEIDELBERG    AS    A    LITERARY    CENTRE.  8l 

form  of  literature.  Although  a  German  version  of  Hamlet 
had  been  played  in  Germany  in  Shakespeare's  lifetime, 
more  than  a  hundred  years  had  to  elapse  before  Shake- 
speare was  even  known  by  name  to  the  Germans. 

Not  from  England,  but  from  the  Latin  peoples  came 
the  regeneration  of  German  literature ;  the  seventeenth 
century  was  the  century  of  the  Renaissance.  The 
history  of  this  movement  in  Germany  is  a  weak  re- 
flection of  the  literary  evolution  which  had  taken  place 
in  Italy  and  France.  JThe  German  humanists  of  the 
fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries  were  the  pioneers ; 
and  in  the  course  of  the  following  century  German  liter- 
ature passed  through  the  same  three  stages  through 
which  Renaissance  literature  elsewhere  passed  :  a  period 
of  vigorous  youth,  a^  middle  period  of  artificiality  and 
stylistic  vagaries,  and  a  third  period  of  classic  rigour. 

For  the  first  of  these  periods  Germany's  immediate 
models  were  the  poets  of  the  French  "  Pleiade."  In 
Heidelberg,  the  focus  of  the  German  Renaissance,  Paul 
Schede,  or,  as  he  Latinised  his  name,  Melissus,  had, 
as  early  as  1572,  translated  into  German  verse  the  French 
version  of  the  Psalms  by  Clement  Marot,  and,  four- 
teen years  later,  when  Schede  was  settled  as  librarian 
in  Heidelberg,  a  number  of  scholarly  writers  gathered 
round  him.  The  spokesman  of  this  circle  was  ].  VV. 
Zincgref  (1591-1635),  who,  besides  publishing  in  1624 
as  a  supplement  to  his  edition  of  Opitz's  poems  an 
anthology  of  the  poetry  of  the  group,  Anhang  unter- 
schiedlicher  ausgesuchter  Gedichte,  wrote  himself  Scharf- 
sinnige  kluge  Spruche  (1626)  which  reveal  a  healthy 
and  sympathetic  understanding  for  the  German  people. 
A  greater  poet  was  the  Swabian,  G.  R.  Weckherlin  (1584- 
1653),  whose  collection  of  Oden  rmd  Gesdnge  (1618-19) 
was  the  first  sign  of  promise  in  the  new  movement. 
Weckherlin  was  a  widely  travelled  man  and  had  lived 
so  long  in  England  as  to  have  become  practically  an 
Englishman;  he  was  Milton's  predecessor  as  "secretary 
for  foreign  tongues  "  to  the  English  Government. 

The  leader  of  the  German  Renaissance,  Martin  Opitz, 
F 


82  THE    RENAISSANCE    IN    GERMANY. 

was  not  a  South  German,  but  a  Silesian.  It  was  in 
Heidelberg,  however,  that  his  genius  was  first  fully 
recognised.  Born  at  Bunzlau  in  1597,  he  came  as  a 
student  to  Heidelberg  in  1619,  where  a  Latin  treatise, 
entitled  Aristarchus  (1617),  and  some  poetry  had  heralded 
his  arrival.  During  the  few  months  he  stayed  in  Heidel- 
berg, the  Renaissance  movement  in  German  literature  was 
born.  In  1620  Opitz  went  to  Holland,  where  he  came 
under  the  influence  of  the  Dutch  Renaissance  movement, 
especially  of  Daniel  Heinsius  (1580-1655).  His  life  was 
chequered  and  varied  enough  ;  we  find  him  for  a  time 
in  Holstein,  then  as  a  professor  in  Transylvania ;  in 
Vienna,  a  little  later,  he  was  formally  crowned  laureate  by 
the  Emperor  Ferdinand  II.,  who  subsequently  ennobled 
him  as  Opitz  von  Boberfeld.  For  a  time  he  was 
secretary  to  the  notorious  persecutor  of  the  Protestants, 
Graf  Hannibal  von  Dohna,  who  provided  him  with  the 
means  of  visiting  Paris.  In  1632  Opitz  was  obliged  to 
seek  a  new  patron,  whom  he  found  in  the  person  of  the 
Protestant  Prince  Ulrich  of  Holstein  ;  finally  he  trans- 
ferred his  services  to  the  King  of  Poland,  and  settled  in 
Danzig,  where  he  died  of  the  plague  in  1639. 

Although  but  mediocrely  gifted,  both  as  a  poet  and  as 
a  critic,  Opitz  was  the  most  commanding  literary  person- 
ality of  his  century  in  Germany ;  his  contemporaries 
looked  up  to  him  as  the  embodiment  of  the  Renaissance 
ideals.  His  essay  on  poetic  theory,  the  Buck  von  der 
deutschen  Poeterei  (1624),  the  most  famous  and  influential 
German  book  of  the  seventeenth  century,  was  pieced 
together  in  the  course  of  a  few  days  out  of  the  Renais- 
sance treatises  on  poetics  from  Scaliger  to  Ronsard  and 
Du  Bellay ;  it  was  only  an  original  book  in  so  far  as  Opitz 
adapted  the  foreign  ideas  to  German  requirements.  He 
made  claims  for  the  German  tongue  as  a  literary  medium, 
and  deprecated  the  use  of  Latin  and  of  foreign  words  ;  he 
recognised  that  in  German  verse  accentuated  and  unaccen- 
tuated  syllables  take  the  place  of  the  longs  and  shorts  of 
Latin  metre;  and  he  gave  Germany  those  "rules"  which 
all  the  Renaissance  theorists  believed  to  be  indispensable 


MARTIN    OPITZ.  83 

to  great  poetry.  Opitz's  original  verse  exemplifies  only 
too  plainly  his  theory  that  an  observance  of  the  rules  was 
sufficient  to  make  the  poet.  His  poetry  is,  however,  not 
all  uninspired,  and  his  best  poems,  the  collection  entitled 
Trostgedichte  in  Widerwdrtigkeit  des  Krieges  (1633),  con- 
tain lines  as  good  as  any  written  in  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury in  Germany.  He  laboured  diligently  to  bring  German 
literature  under  the  Renaissance  yoke ;  he  translated 
Sophocles  and  Seneca,  as  well  as  Rinuccini's  Italian  opera 
Dafne(\62']} ;  he  introduced  the  Renaissance  novel  with 
translations  of  Barclay's  Argents  (1626)  and  Sidney's 
Arcadia  (1629),  and  followed  these  with  a  pastoral  of  his 
own,  the  Schdferei  von  der  Nymphen  Hercine  (1630). 

In  the  furtherance  of  his  aims  Opitz  was  assisted  by  the 
many  literary  or  rather  linguistic  societies  which  sprang 
up  throughout  Germany  in  the  first  half  of  the  seventeenth 
century  and  tided  German  literature  over  the  stormy 
epoch  of  the  war.  The  first  of  these  societies,  "  Die 
fruchtbringende  Gesellschaft,"  or  "  Der  Palmenorden," 
founded  under  the  presidency  of  Prince  Ludwig  of 
Anhalt-Cothen  in  the  year  1617,  was  a  direct  imitation 
of  the  famous  linguistic  academy  of  Florence,  the  Ac- 
cademia  della  Crusca  or  "  Bran  Academy,"  so  called 
because  it  was  designed  to  purify  the  pure  flour  of  Italian 
speech  from  the  bran  of  barbarisms.  In  the  same  way 
the  German  society  followed  "fructifying"  aims,  each 
of  the  members  taking  a  pseudonym  bearing  on  that 
function.  In  Hamburg,  again,  Johann  Rist  (1607-67), 
a  lyric  poet  and  dramatist  of  some  distinction,  founded 
the  "  Elbschwanenorden."  Such  societies  no  doubt 
furthered  the  linguistic  reforms  for  which  Opitz  fought ; 
but  in  literature  the  results  of  their  activity  were  more 
questionable.  G.  P.  Harsdorffer  (1607-58),  for  instance, 
one  of  the  founders  of  the  famous  Niirnberg  society, 
"Der  gekronte  Blumenorden  "  or  "  Pegnitz  Shepherds," 
reduced,  in  all  seriousness,  the  poetic  theories  of  Opitz 
to  absurdity  by  writing  a  Poetischer  Trickier  (1647-53), 
which  professed  to  "pour"  the  art  of  poetry  into  any 
one  in  six  hours. 


84  THE    RENAISSANCE    IN    GERMANY. 

With  Opitz  the  literary  focus  of  Germany  was  transferred 
to  the  north-east;  the  members  of  his  school,  which  is  some- 
times called  the  "  First  Silesian  School,"  made  Konigsberg 
for  a  time  their  headquarters.  At  least  two  poets  among 
Opitz's  disciples,  Simon  Dach  (1605-59)  and  Paul 
Fleming  (1609-40),  were  more  gifted  than  their  master. 
These  two  men  present  the  greatest  possible  contrast ; 
the  one  was  a  shy,  retiring,  melancholy  professor  of  poetry 
in  Konigsberg,  the  other  a  burly  Saxon  who  wandered  far 
afield — he  spent  five  years  in  the  East — and  looked  life 
in  the  face  with  a  manly  straightforwardness  ;  but  they 
have  both  one  quality  in  common,  they  make  us  forget 
their  allegiance  to  Opitz  and  his  rules. 

While  Dach  and  Fleming  thus  showed  that  the  Renais- 
sance rules  were  not  inconsistent  with  the  production  of 
genuine  poetry,  on  another,  and  perhaps  the  most  gifted 
of  them  all,  Opitz's  fetters  lie  heavy,  namely,  on  the  chief 
dramatist  of  the  German  Renaissance,  Andreas  Gryphius. 
Like  Opitz,  Gryphius  was  a  Silesian  ;  he  was  born  in  1 6 1 6 
— the  year  of  Shakespeare's  death — in  Breslau,  as  the 
syndic  of  which  town  he  died  in  1664,  a  hundred  years 
after  Shakespeare  was  born.  His  lyric  poetry,  especially 
the  Sonn-  und  Feiertags-Sonette  (1639)  and  Kirchhofsgedan- 
ken  (1656),  show  him  to  have  been  a  man  who  had  tasted 
more  of  the  bitterness  of  life  than  his  brother  poets  ;  he 
felt  more  modernly,  and  had  what  the  principles  of  Opitz 
made  extremely  difficult  to  practise,  the  art  of  expressing 
those  feelings  sincerely.  It  was  only  with  difficulty  that 
Gryphius  squeezed  and  trimmed  his  melancholy  reflections 
to  fit  the  recognised  verse-forms.  Still  more  disastrous 
was  the  effect  of  the  Renaissance  poetics  on  his  dramatic 
work.  Under  more  favourable  conditions,  Gryphius 
might  have  been  the  founder  of  a  national  drama ;  as  it 
was,  he  struggled  vainly  with  the  bloodless,  epic  tragedy 
of  the  Renaissance  theatre,  and  with  no  better  models  to 
imitate  than  the  plays  of  the  Dutch  poets,  Hooft  and 
Vondel  ;  it  is  thus  no  wonder  that  his  Leo  Armenius 
(1650),  Katharina  von  Georgien  (1657),  and  even  such 
daring  innovations  as  his  tragedy,  Ermordete  Majestat, 


GRYPHIUS   AND    LOGAU.  85 

oder  Carolus  Stuardus^Konig  von  Gross- Britannien  (1657), 
on  an  almost  contemporary  theme,  and  Cardenio  und 
Celinde  (1657),  a  forerunner  of  the  "tragedy  of  common 
life "  of  the  eighteenth  century,  fail  to  convey  even  a 
semblance  of  reality.  In  comedy,  Gryphius  retained  a 
freer  hand,  perhaps  because  the  paralysing  influence  of 
Seneca  did  not  lie  so  heavy  on  the  Renaissance  comedy. 
In  his  Horribilicribrifax  (1663),  the  hero  of  which,  a 
bragging  soldier,  was  a  favourite  figure  with  the  Renais- 
sance dramatists,  and  in  Herr  Peter  Squentz  (1663),  a 
merry  adaptation  of  the  comic  scenes  of  the  Midsummer 
Night's  Dream,  Gryphius  revealed  comic  power  of  a  quite 
remarkable  order;  these  are  the  best,  indeed  the  only 
outstanding  German  comedies  of  the  seventeenth 
century. 

Perhaps  the  greatest  positive  achievement  which, 
besides  its  literary  theory,  we  owe  directly  to  the  Renais- 
sance in  Germany,  is  the  epigrams  of  the  poet  who,  in 
the  "  Fruchtbringende  Gesellschaft,"  bore  the  sobriquet  of 
"der  Verkleinernde,"  Friedrich  von  Logau.  Logau,  too, 
was  a  Silesian,  but  no  friend  of  the  Opitzian  school ; 
Opitz  he  admired  as  a  poet,  but  he  had  little  faith 
in  the  art  of  making  poetry  by  rule  of  thumb.  His 
outlook  on  the  life  of  the  time  was  sane  and  wise ;  he 
could  rise  sufficiently  above  the  strife  of  the  day  to  see 
the  hollowness  of  a  religious  faith  that  permitted  the 
callous  bloodshed  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War ;  he  had  faith 
enough  in  his  own  people  to  ridicule  their  slavish  imita- 
tion of  French  manners  and  customs,  and  to  condemn 
unsparingly  the  taste  which  interlarded  his  native  language 
with  French  words  and  phrases.  Born  at  Brockut,  near 
Nimptsch,  in  1604,  Logau  held  an  official  position  in  the 
service  of  the  Duke  of  Liegnitz ;  and  he  died  at  Liegnitz 
in  1655.  In  1638  appeared  his  first  collection  of  epigrams 
under  the  title  Erstes  Hundert  teutscher  Reimenspriiche, 
but  the  main  collection  was  not  published  until  1654, 
Deutscher  Sinngedichte  drei  Tausend.  Logau  concealed 
his  authorship  under  an  anagram,  "Salomon  von  Golaw," 
and  so  effectually  that  it  was  not  until  over  a  hundred 


86  THE    RENAISSANCE    IN    GERMANY. 

years  later  that  Ramler  and  Lessing  in  their  reprint  of 
the  epigrams  revealed  who  "Golaw"  really  was.  As 
far  as  form  is  concerned,  Logau  is  an  epigrammatist  of 
the  normal  Renaissance  type — that  is  to  say,  he  takes 
Martial  as  his  model ;  but  he  has  made  the  form  his 
own ;  and  there  are  not  many  among  these  three 
thousand  epigrams  upon  which  he  has  not  set  the  stamp 
of  his  own  strong  personality.  Logau  is  Germany's 
greatest  epigrammatist. 

Thus  in  the  seventeenth  century  the  politer,  more 
polished  epigram  took  the  place  of  the  full-blooded  satire 
of  the  Reformation  ;  indeed,  it  almost  seemed  as  if  satire 
had  now  withdrawn  to  Low  German  lands.  The  rep- 
resentative satirists  of  the  period,  Johann  Lauremberg 
(1590-1658)  and  Joachim  Rachel  (1618-69),  are  both 
Low  Germans.  The  former,  a  native  of  Rostock,  wrote  in 
1652  four  admirable  Scherzgedichte  in  the  Low  German 
dialect  of  his  home.  A  kindly  humour  rather  than  satire 
is  the  ground-tone  of  Lauremberg's  poetry,  and  it  seems 
in  keeping  with  the  homely  dialect  which,  from  motives 
of  patriotism,  he  chose.  In  the  High  German  translation 
which  soon  followed,  the  poems  lose  something  of  their 
force.  The  faith  of  Rachel  in  Opitz,  on  the  other  hand, 
was  stronger  than  his  patriotism ;  in  early  Volkslieder 
he  showed  promise  as  a  Low  German  poet,  but  he 
preferred  to  write  his  six  Satirische  Gedichte  (1664)  in 
the  High  German  speech  which  Opitz  alone  recognised  ; 
he  has  not,  however,  the  originality  and  force  of 
Lauremberg. 

The  lyric  poetry  of  the  seventeenth  century  was  not 
restricted  to  the  experiments  in  classic  forms  which 
the  more  rigid  adherents  of  the  Renaissance  movement 
favoured,  and  the  more  sincere,  if  still  classic,  lyrics  of 
poets  like  Dach  and  Fleming.  The  lyric  genius  of  the 
people,  which  in  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries  had 
produced  the  great  Volkslieder,  found  its  outlet  now  in 
religious  poetry ;  the  seventeenth  century  is  the  age  of 
the  German  hymn.  Both  catholic  and  protestant  poets 
contributed  to  this  religious  lyric,  the  former  giving  ex- 


RELIGIOUS    MYSTICISM,  87 

pression  to  the  subtle  mystic  and  allegorical  tendencies 
of  the  age,  the  latter  ministering  in  a  practical  way  to 
the  immediate  spiritual  needs  of  the  people. 

Now,  as  in  the  pre-Reformation  age,  the  revival  of  a 
more  intense  religious  life  was  heralded  by  mysticism.  In 
1612  Jakob  Bohme  (1575-1624),  a  shoemaker  of  Gorlitz 
in  Silesia,  published  his  first  book,  Aurora,  oder  Morgenriite 
im  Aufgang.  Under  the  guise  of  a  strange,  allegorical 
imagery,  Bohme  set  forth  in  this  book  a  spiritual  mysti- 
cism, which  acted  as  a  solvent  on  the  rapidly  stiffen- 
ing dogmas  of  the  churches.  His  philosophy  was  a 
leaven  of  inspiration  for  the  lyric  poetry  of  the  century. 
Bohme's  immediate  influence  is  to  be  seen  in  the  poetry 
of  the  Silesian  writer,  Johann  Scheffler,  who  preferred  to 
be  known  as  "Angelus  Silesius."  Scheffler  was  born  in 
the  year  in  which  Bohme  died,  and  of  a  protestant  family ; 
he  was  educated  as  a  doctor  and  practised  in  Breslau,  and 
in  1652  became  a  convert  to  Catholicism.  In  1657  his 
poetry  appeared  in  two  volumes,  Heilige  Seelenlust,  oder 
geistliche  Hirtenlieder  der  in  ihren  Jesiim  verliebten 
Psyche,  and  Geistreiche  Sinn-  und  Schlussreime  zur  gottlichen 
Beschaulichkeit,  the  latter  better  known  under  the  title  it 
bore  in  the  second  edition,  Der  cherubinische  Wanders- 
mann  (1674).  Scheffler  died  in  1677.  He  held  aloof 
from  the  German  Renaissance  movement,  but  it  is  clear 
from  his  poetry  that  his  horizon  was  bounded  by  the 
pastoral  poetry  of  the  time ;  his  allegory  has  the  unmis- 
takable Renaissance  stamp.  His  strength  lies,  however, 
not  in  the  literary  forms  and  traditions  he  adopted,  but 
in  the  strange  mystic  couplets  and  strophes  of  the 
Cherubinische  Wandersmann.  The  logical  consequences 
of  Bohme's  pantheism,  which  saw  God  in  all  things  and 
preached  the  oneness  of  the  human  soul  with  God,  were 
carried  out  by  Scheffler  with  a  ruthlessness  that  does  not 
shrink  before  the  most  startling  paradoxes. 

The  fusion  of  pious  religious  feeling  with  the  allegory 
of  the  Renaissance  is  also  to  be  seen  in  the  poetry  of 
Friedrich  von  Spec  (1591-1635).  Although  a  strict 
Jesuit,  Spec  did  not  allow  himself  to  be  blinded  by  the 


88  THE    RENAISSANCE    IN    GERMANY. 

superstitions  of  his  time  ;  his  own  life  was  embittered  by 
his  having,  as  professor  in  Wurzburg,  to  prepare  for  the 
stake  witches  in  whose  innocence  he  believed.  He 
died  of  fever  caught  while  nursing  the  sick  and  the 
wounded  in  the  hospital  of  Treves.  His  poetry  is 
collected  under  the  fantastic  title,  Trutz-Nachtigall,  oder 
geistlich-poetisches  Lustwaldlein  (1649), — a  book  which,  in 
spite  of  its  artificial  conventions,  has  still  a  certain 
charm  ;  the  outward  form  may  be  of  the  Renaissance, 
but  the  calm  humanity  of  Spec's  faith  and  the  warmth  of 
his  feeling  for  nature  make  the  impression  of  complete 
sincerity. 

The  national  religious  poetry  of  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury, the  real  heir  of  the  Volkslied,  was  unquestionably 
the  protestant  hymn.  It  was  a  form  of  literature  on 
which  neither  the  war  nor  the  preoccupation  of  the 
nation  with  embittered  religious  strife  seems  to  have  had 
any  deterrent  effect ;  in  hours  of  adversity  the  people 
turned  to  their  hymns  as  a  consolation  and  a  refuge. 
The  hymn  of  this  century  was  directly  modelled  on  that 
of  Luther  ;  and  the  line  of  great  hymn-writers  from  Luther 
onwards  was  continuous.  At  the  same  time  there  is,  in  the 
course  of  these  hundred  years,  strangely  little  develop- 
ment to  record ;  the  hymn  became  perhaps  more  harmoni- 
ous and  less  militant,  but  the  spiritual  standpoint  changed 
little,  and  the  poetic  form  even  less.  Paul  Gerhardt 
(1607-76),  the  greatest  religious  poet  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  was  a  protestant  preacher  of  the  Lutheran  type, 
first  at  Berlin,  then  at  Liibben  on  the  Spree ;  and  he 
fought  all  his  life  for  what  he  believed  to  be  the  best 
interests  of  protestantism.  His  hymns,  of  which  the  first 
collected  edition  appeared  under  the  title  Geistliche 
Andachten  in  1667,  were  written  in  the  direct  service  of 
the  church  and  form  the  backbone  of  the  protestant 
hymnal.  It  can  hardly  be  said  that  Gerhardt  was  in  the 
highest  sense  an  inspired  poet ;  his  hymns  were  not  even 
the  expression  of  a  personal,  spiritual  need ;  his  aim  was 
merely  to  express  in  the  simple  language  of  the  people  its 
spiritual  faith.  The  dictum  that  the  great  battle-songs 


THE    PROTESTANT    HYMN.  89 

and  great  hymns  of  the  world  have  never  been  written 
by  its  greatest  poets  is  eminently  true  of  German  religious 
poetry  in  the  seventeenth  century.  For  Gerhardt  was 
only  one  of  many  Lutheran  pastors  who  at  that  time 
composed  religious  poetry  which  found  its  way  to  the 
hearts  of  the  people ;  indeed,  it  is  extraordinary  how 
many  masterpieces  of  the  German  hymnal  emanated  from 
otherwise  quite  unknown  men, — men  who  had  no  kind 
of  relation  to  literature  at  all.  If  Gerhardt  stands  out 
prominently  from  the  many,  it  is  not  because  he  was  as 
a  poet  so  much  greater  than  his  contemporaries,  but 
because  he  wrote  a  larger  number  of  great  hymns.  From 
the  decay  of  the  Volkslied  in  the  later  sixteenth  century 
to  the  first  quarter  at  least  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
German  lyric  poetry  is  to  be  seen  at  its  best  in  the  hymns 
of  the  protestant  church. 


CHAPTER     IX. 

THE    LATER    SEVENTEENTH    CENTURY. 

SUBJECTION  to  the  ideals  of  the  Latin  Renaissance  was 
one  characteristic  feature  of  German  literature  in  the 
seventeenth  century;  another  was  the  predominance — a 
predominance  in  which,  however,  Germany  did  not  stand 
alone — of  the  novel.  The  novel  swallowed  up,  as  it  were, 
several  forms  of  literature  which  in  the  previous  century 
existed  independently  of  it ;  satire  appears  now  mainly 
in  the  form  of  fiction,  and  didactic  poetry  has  given 
place  to  didactic  novels. 

The  beginnings  of  a  modern,  that  is  to  say,  modern 
as  opposed  to  mediaeval,  novel,  have  been  traced  in 
Germany  to  a  writer  who  has  been  already  mentioned, 
Jorg  Wickram  of  Colmar.  The  influence  of  French  and 
Italian  models  no  doubt  assisted  Wickram  to  get  beyond 
the  purely  mediaeval  type  of  romance,  as  he  did  in  his  best 
novels,  Der  jungen  Knaben  Spiegel  (1554),  Der  irrreitende 
Pilger  (1556),  and  Der  Goldfaden  (1557).  Wickram 
was  modern  in  so  far  as  he  recognised  the  reorganisation 
of  society  on  a  wider,  more  democratic  basis,  and  saw  in 
the  psychological  development  of  his  personages  a  more 
interesting  theme  for  his  fiction  than  the  succession  of 
adventures  which  made  up  the  older  novel.  But  the 
demolition  of  the  mediaeval  romance  was  more  effectually 
carried  out  in  Spain ;  and  the  Spanish  novel  made  its 
appearance  in  Germany  early  in  the  seventeenth  century. 
Lazarillo  de  Tonnes,  the  earliest  Spanish  picaresque 
romance,  was  translated  into  German  in  1617,  and  Don 


SATIRE    AND    SERMON.  QI 

Quixote  partially  translated  at  least  in  1625.  In  1642-43 
appeared  in  a  complete  edition  the  Wunderliche  und 
wahrhaftige  Gesichte  Philanders  von  Sittewald,  a  remark- 
able contribution  to  satiric  fiction.  The  author  of  this 
book,  which  is  a  German  imitation  of  the  Suenos,  or 
"  Dreams  "  of  Francisco  de  Quevedo,  was  Hans  Michael 
Moscherosch  (1601-69),  an  Alsatian,  whose  family  was 
probably  of  Spanish  origin.  As  an  official  in  villages  in 
Lorraine  he  had  had  more  than  his  share  of  the  horrors 
of  the  Thirty  Years'  War ;  he  then  obtained  an  appoint- 
ment as  town-secretary  in  Strassburg,  where  he  wrote  his 
Gesichte,  embodying  in  them,  no  doubt,  many  of  his  own 
earlier  experiences.  Vanity,  hypocrisy,  injustice,  licen- 
tiousness, the  slavery  of  Germany  in  matters  of  customs 
and  taste  to  France,  are  the  themes  of  his  satires.  In 
the  vision  entitled  Hollenkinder  he  sees  his  contem- 
poraries floundering  in  the  flames  of  hell,  and  in  Soldaten- 
leben  the  demoralisation  of  the  land  by  the  mercenaries 
of  the  war  is  painted  in  vividly  realistic  colours.  Only 
about  one  half  of  Moscherosch's  book  is  a  direct 
imitation  of  the  Spanish  work  ;  the  rest  is  entirely 
his  own. 

Links  may  also  be  found  connecting  the  fiction  of  the 
seventeenth  century  with  a  form  of  German  prose  which 
had  divided  the  field  with  satire  in  the  preceding  century, 
namely,  didactic  and  religious  literature,  above  all,  the 
sermon.  Here  two  writers  have  to  be  mentioned,  the 
Protestant  North  German,  Johann  Balthasar  Schupp 
(1610-61)  and  the  South  German  monk,  Ulrich  Megerle, 
better  known  as  Abraham  a  Santa  Clara  (1644-1709). 
The  lives  and  the  writings  of  these  two  men  form  an  in- 
structive contrast.  Schupp,  a  native  of  Giessen,  was  an 
admirable  example  of  the  pugnacious  Lutheran  clergy- 
man ;  he  had  himself  had  experience  of  the  rough 
student-life  of  the  time — the  University  of  Giessen  was 
notorious  in  this  respect  in  the  seventeenth  century — and 
he  had  wandered  on  foot  all  over  Europe.  He  was  for  a 
time  professor  in  Marburg  before  he  accepted  a  call  to 
the  church  of  St  Jakobi  in  Hamburg.  In  Hamburg  his 


Q2  THE    LATER    SEVENTEENTH    CENTURY. 

rough  popular  tone  was  not  to  all  tastes,  and  his  career 
there  was  not  free  from  thorns ;  hut  fighting  was  the 
breath  of  life  to  him,  and  his  words  carried  conviction. 
More  interesting  to  us  to-day  than  his  sermons  is  the 
little  tract,  Der  Freund  in  der  Not  (1657),  in  which  he 
chronicled  as  a  warning  to  his  son  his  own  experiences 
at  the  university. 

Schupp  did  not  shrink  from  jests  and  witticisms  in 
his  sermons,  but  in  this  respect  Abraham  a  Santa  Clara 
(1644-1 709),  who  rose  to  be  Court  preacher  in  Vienna, 
left  him  far  behind ;  where  Schupp  is  merely  coarse, 
Santa  Clara  is  scurrilous.  The  witty  monk  is  wholly 
lacking  in  the  North  German's  earnestness  ;  but  his 
biting  sarcasm  was  quite  as  effective  in  dealing  with  his 
public  as  Schupp's  direct  bludgeoning.  Schupp  had  the 
blunt,  straightforward  Lutheran  mind,  Santa  Clara  the 
mercurial  imagination  of  a  wit  and  a  poet.  His  tracts, 
such  as  MerKs  Wien  !  (1680)  and  Ai/f,  auf,  ihr 
Christen!  (1680),  of  which  the  latter  is  perhaps  best 
known,  as  it  served  Schiller  as  a  model  for  the  sermon  of 
the  Capuchin  monk  in  Wallensteins  Lager,  belong  to 
literature  in  a  higher  degree  than  to  theology ;  they  stand 
in  line  with  the  writings  of  Murner  and  Fischart  in  the 
previous  century.  In  the  mixture  of  sermon  and  novel 
which  makes  up  his  chief  work,  Judas  der  Erzschelm 
(1686),  the  novel  is  the  more  interesting  component. 
Santa  Clara  revives  here  the  mediaeval  romance  which 
gathered  round  the  figure  of  Judas  Ischariot,  and  repre- 
sented him  to  have  been  the  victim  of  an  CEdipus-like 
fate  before  his  appearance  in  the  Gospel  narrative.  But, 
after  all,  however  interesting  Santa  Clara's  story  may  be, 
he  obviously  attached  more  importance  to  the  interspersed 
sermons  than  to  his  plot.  The  main  value  of  the  book 
now  is  that  it  shows  how  the  new  prose  romance  was  en- 
croaching on  all  domains,  even  on  that  of  the  sermon. 

But  the  chief  German  novel  of  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury, and  the  greatest  imaginative  work  of  that  century  in 
the  German  tongue,  had  appeared  nearly  twenty  years 
before  Judas  der  Erzschelm.  This  was  Der  abenteurliche 


GRIMMELSHAUSEN'S  "  SIMPLICISSIMUS."       93 

Simplitissimus  Teutsch,  das  ist :  die  Beschreibung  des 
Lebens  eines  seltsamen  Vaganten,  ganannt  Melchior  Stern- 
fels  -von  fuchsheim,  by  Johann  Jakob  Christoffel  von 
Grimmelshausen.  A  native  of  Hesse,  where  he  was 
born  about  1624,  Grimmelshausen  had  tasted  to  the 
full  the  horrors  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War.  As  a  boy  of 
ten  he  had  been  carried  off,  like  his  hero,  by  soldiers, 
and  no  doubt  much  else  in  his  novel  is  autobiography 
rather  than  romance.  The  last  years  of  his  life  were 
passed  as  a  town  official  of  the  little  town  of  Renchen, 
on  the  western  borders  of  the  Black  Forest.  He  died  in 
1676.  Grimmelshausen's  first  literary  efforts  were  in  the 
style  which  had  been  made  popular  by  Moscherosch  ;  he 
also  translated  a  French  novel  of  adventure ;  then,  in 
1669,  appeared  his  Simplicissimus,  which,  like  the 
Gesichte  of  his  predecessor,  was  also  influenced  by 
Spanish  literature;  Simplicissimus  is  a  "Schelmenroman" 
or  picaresque  romance. 

Simplicius  Simplicissimus  is  brought  up  in  the  Spessart 
by  a  peasant,  whom  he  believes  to  be  his  father.  He  is  a 
simple  child  who  plays  his  "  Sackpfeife,"  or  bagpipe,  and 
herds  his  flock  in  happy  innocence.  His  first  glimpse  of 
the  world  comes  to  him,  as  it  came  to  Parzival  in  Wolfram 
von  Eschenbach's  epic,  from  soldiers,  rough  cuirassiers 
who  fall  upon  the  village,  pillage  and  burn  the  houses, 
and  carry  off  Simplicissimus,  he  clinging  to  his  bag- 
pipe as  his  most  precious  possession.  Like  Parzival 
again,  he  comes  to  a  hermit  in  a  forest,  who,  as  he 
discovers  long  afterwards,  is  his  own  father,  and  for  two 
years  he  sits  at  the  hermit's  feet  learning  wisdom  from 
him.  The  hermit  dies  and  Simplicius  once  more  falls 
into  the  hands  of  soldiers.  He  is  brought  to  the  Gover- 
nor of  Hanau,  who  learns  that  he  is  his  own  nephew, 
and  makes  him  his  page.  But  Simplicius  is  ill-adapted 
for  a  life  of  this  kind ;  he  is  only  laughed  at,  and  an 
attempt  is  even  made  to  convert  him  into  a  court  fool 
by  unhinging  his  mind.  One  day  he  is  carried  off  by 
Croats  and  experiences  all  the  barbarism  of  the  war. 
Gradually,  however,  he  accustoms  himself  to  their  wild 


94  THE    LATER    SEVENTEENTH    CENTURY. 

mode  of  life  and  becomes  a  thief  and  an  adventurer.  In 
two  comrades,  Olivier  and  Herzbruder,  he  finds  his  good 
and  his  bad  angel,  and  the  fortune  of  war  for  a  time  favours 
him.  He  falls  into  the  hands  of  the  Swedes,  but  is  well 
treated  ;  he  also  discovers  a  large  treasure,  and  is  inveigled 
into  an  unhappy  marriage.  In  the  course  of  further  ad- 
ventures he  finds  his  way  to  Cologne  and  Paris,  where  he 
prospers  as  "  beau  Alman."  Meanwhile,  however,  he  has 
lost  all  his  wealth,  and  has  no  option  but  to  become  a 
soldier  again.  His  old  comrade  Olivier  tempts  him  to 
join  him  in  a  life  of  open  brigandage ;  Herzbruder  leads 
him  back  to  his  true  self.  His  wife  is  dead,  and  he 
longs  for  a  peaceful  life.  He  buys  a  farm  and  marries 
again,  but  this  marriage  is  also  unhappy,  and  he  seeks 
consolation  in  his  love  for  adventure ;  he  goes  out  once 
more  into  the  world,  penetrating  as  far  as  Asia.  After 
three  years  he  returns  to  find  his  foster-father  in  the 
Spessart  dead,  and  settles  down  among  his  long-forgotten 
books  to  a  life  of  meditation  and  repentance. 

Later,  Grimmelshausen  was  tempted  to  provide  his 
story  with  a  continuation,  which,  however,  like  most 
continuations,  is  too  consciously  an  effort  to  surpass  the 
original  story  ;  only  the  close,  where  the  hero  retires  to 
a  lonely  island,  has  a  special  interest  as  providing  a  link 
between  the  picaresque  novel  of  the  seventeenth  century 
and  the  novel  of  realistic  adventure  ushered  in  by  Robin- 
son Crusoe  in  the  eighteenth.  Much  better  than  this 
continuation  are  Grimmelshausen's  shorter  stories,  Die 
Landstorzerin  Courasche  (ca.  1669),  Der  selfsame  Spring- 
insfeld  (1670),  and  Das  witnderbarliche  Vogelnest  (1672), 
which,  grouped  together  as  Simplidanische  Schriften,  afford 
pictures  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War  supplementary  to  those 
in  his  great  novel. 

A  less  spontaneous  genius  than  Grimmelshausen  was 
Christian  Weise  (1642-1708),  rector  of  the  Gymnasium 
at  Zittau,  who  distinguished  himself  as  a  lyric  poet,  as 
a  novelist,  and  a  dramatist.  He  is  perhaps  seen  to  best 
advantage  in  his  first  capacity ;  the  natural  tone  of  his 
Uberflussige  Gedanken  der  griinenden  Jugend  (1668),  much 


CHRISTIAN    WEISE.  Q5 

as  he  himself  despised  these  poems  in  later  life,  is  a  relief 
after  the  stiff  artificiality  of  the  Renaissance  lyric.  But 
Weise  did  not  himself  see  the  salvation  of  literature  in 
this  return  to  natural  simplicity  ;  he  rather  believed  that 
it  must  become  more  didactic  and  moral.  His  novels,  of 
which  Die  drei  drgsten  Erznarren  in  der  ganzen  Welt 
(1672),  and  Die  drei  klilgsten  Leute  in  der  ganzen  Welt 
(1675)  are  best  known,  are  satirical  in  an  unambigu- 
ously didactic  way,  not  with  Grimmelshausen's  genial 
openness.  As  a  dramatist,  Weise  was  extraordinarily 
prolific,  but  only  about  half  of  his  fifty-five  plays  have 
been  published.  These,  however,  stand  apart  from  the 
general  literary  movement  of  the  century,  for  they  were 
written  in  the  first  instance  for  performance  by  the 
author's  scholars  in  Zittau ;  like  the  Latin  comedy  of 
the  previous  century,  Weise's  was  a  School  comedy.  In 
the  art  and  technique  of  the  drama  Weise  is  really  no 
further  advanced  than  Gryphius,  but  he  at  least  writes 
a  simpler  and  more  natural  prose.  As  examples  of  his 
plays  may  be  mentioned  Die  triumphierende  Keuschheit 
(1668),  a  modernised  adaptation  of  the  story  of  Joseph 
and  Potiphar,  the  comedy  Baurischer  Macchiavellus 
(1679),  a  tragedy  on  the  subject  of  Masaniello  (1682), 
and  Die  unvergniigte  Seele  (1688).  A  verbose  version  of 
the  Taming  of  the  Shrew,  Komb'die  von  der  bb'sen  Katharina, 
written  in  1705,  has  also  been  recently  reprinted.  But  the 
day  of  the  drama  had  not  yet  come  in  Germany,  and  Weise 
had  little  influence  in  hastening  its  arrival.  In  the  field  of 
fiction  the  worthiest  successor  of  Simp  lid ssimus  was  not 
Weise's  work,  but  another  German  picaresque  novel  on 
Spanish  lines,  Schelmuffskys  wahrhaftige,  curib'se  und  sehr 
gefdhrliche  Reisebeschreibung  zu  Wasser  und  Lande  (i  696). 
The  author  of  this  vividly  written  braggart  romance,  the 
forerunner  of  the  celebrated  Miinchhausen,  was  only  dis- 
covered in  comparatively  recent  years  to  have  been  a 
young  student,  Christian  Reuter,  born  near  Halle  in 
1665. 

In    the   last    quarter   of  the    seventeenth   century  the 
German   Renaissance   passed   into  what   we   have   called 


96  THE    LATER    SEVENTEENTH    CENTURY. 

the  second  phase  in  the  general  development  of  Renais- 
sance literature — that  is  to  say,  the  phase  of  degeneration 
which  in  all  European  literatures  set  in  after  the  first 
outburst  of  early  'Renaissance  poetry  and  preceded  the 
second,  riper  period  dominated  by  French  classicism. 
The  phase  of  German  literature  now  to  be  considered, 
the  so-called  "  Second  Silesian  School,"  is,  in  the  evolu- 
tion of  Renaissance  literature,  parallel  to  the  movement 
which  in  Italy  was  represented  by  Marino,  in  Spain  by 
Gongora,  in  England  by  Lyly  and  the  Euphuists,  and 
in  France  by  the  precieuses  ridicules  of  the  Hotel  de 
Rambouillet.  Thus  at  a  time  when  France  had  touched 
the  zenith  of  her  greatest  period  of  classicism,  Germany 
had  hardly  even  reached  the  stage  preparatory  to  such 
a  period. 

The  leaders  of  the  Second  Silesian  School  were 
Christian  Hofmann  von  Fjtofmannswaldau  (1617-79) 
and  Daniel  Kaspar  von  Lohenstein  (1635-83),  one  the 
representative  lyric  poet,  the  other  the  representative 
dramatist  of  the  time.  Hofmannswaldau  was  a  native 
of  Breslau,  where,  after  extensive  travels,  he  ultimately 
settled ;  he  had  been  brought  up  in  the  literary  tenets 
of  Opitz,  and  from  Italy  he  introduced  the  "  liebliche 
Schreibart "  of  Guarini  and  Marino.  He  translated  the 
former's  Pastor  fido  in  1678,  and  in  1680  earned  for 
himself  the  sobriquet  of  the  "German  Ovid"  with  his 
ffeldenbriefe,  a  collection  of  love  epistles  in  verse  and 
prose,  in  which  the  empty  bombast  and  trivial  gallantry 
of  his  Italian  models  is  carried  to  an  absurd  extreme. 
An  anthology  of  the  lyrics  of  the  school  by  Benjamin 
Neukirch  began  to  appear  in  1695  under  the  title  Herrn 
von  Hofmannswaldau  und  anderer  Deutschen  auserlesene 
Gedichte.  Hofmannswaldau's  lyrics  included  in  this  col- 
lection are  not  perhaps  worse  than  his  Heldenbriefe, 
but  Neukirch's  volume  well  deserves  its  description  as 
the  lowest  point  to  which  the  German  lyric  ever  sank. 

Lohenstein's  dramas  held  out  even  less  hope  for  the 
betterment  of  German  literature.  Although  Lohenstein 
had  Gryphius  at  hand  as  a  model,  his  dramas  recall 


THE    HEROIC    NOVEL.  Q7 

rather  the  very  earliest  and  crudest  forms  of  Renaissance 
tragedy ;  the  main  impression  they  leave  behind  them  is 
of  a  constant  aping  of  Seneca's  style  and  a  striving 
after  a  rhetorical  sublimity  that  is  never  attained.  In 
addition  to  this,  Lohenstein  revels  in  barbarous  horrors  as 
hardly  another  European  poet  of  the  seventeenth  century  ; 
subjects  like  those  of  his  Cleopatra  (1661),  Agrippina 
(1665),  and  Sophonisba  (1680),  do  not  attract  him  by 
their  poetic  possibilities,  but  by  the  opportunities  they 
afford  of  describing  cruelty,  bloodshed,  and  incest. 

As  was  to  be  expected,  the  novel  of  the  Second  Sil- 
esian  School  kept  more  in  touch  with  what  was  being 
done  under  Renaissance  influence  in  other  European 
lands  than  either  its  lyric  or  drama  ;  for  in  the  heroic 
romances  of  France  and  their  equivalents  in  other  lands 
the  artificial  style  of  the  second  Renaissance  period  still 
lingered.  The  French  gallant  novels  found  an  eager 
public  in  Germany,  and  several  had  been  translated  at 
an  early  date  by  the  founder  of  one  of  the  Hamburg 
linguistic  societies,  Philipp  von  Zesen  (1619-89),  a 
native  of  Dessau.  Zesen's  own  stories  of  this  class,  such 
as  Die  adriatische  Rosemund  (1645)  and  Simson,  eine 
Helden-  und  Liebesgeschichte  (1679),  were  no  less  popular. 
That  the  object  of  this  form  of  romance  was  not  merely 
to  entertain,  but  also  to  be  a  school  of  manners,  is  seen 
in  the  lengthy  books  by  Duke  Anton  Ulrich  of  Bruns- 
wick (1633-1714),  Die  durchlduchtige  Syrerin  Aramena 
(1669-73)  and  Die  romische  Oktavia  (1677),  as  well  as 
in  Herkules  und  Valiska  (1659-60)  by  A.  H.  Bucholtz 
(1607-71),  a  novel  which  enjoyed  an  extraordinarily  long- 
lived  popularity.  Didactic,  too,  are  the  voluminous  geo- 
graphical and  historical  romances  of  E.  W.  Happel 
(1648-90).  Two  books,  however,  stand  out  from  this 
general  mass  of  artificial  fiction,  and  are  worthy  of  more 
careful  attention.  One  is  Die  asiatische  Banise,  oder 
blutiges  dock  mutiges  Peru  (1689),  by  Heinrich  Anshelm 
von  Ziegler  (1663-96),  the  best  German  novel  of  the 
heroic  type,  a  book  the  exotic  scenery  and  vigorously 
drawn  characters  of  which  kept  it  alive,  in  spite  of  the 

G 


98  THE    LATER    SEVENTEENTH    CENTURY. 

rhetorical  bombast  of  its  language,  until  late  in  the 
eighteenth  century.  The  other  is  Lohenstein's  one 
novel,  Grossmii tiger  Feldlurr  Arminius,  oder  Hermann 
ah  ein  tapferer  Beschirmer  der  deutschen  Freiheit  nebst 
seiner  durchlauchtigsten  Thusnelda  (1689-90),  which  in 
its  patriotism  and  truth  of  observation  stands  in  closer 
relation  to  actuality  than  any  other  product  of  Lohen- 
stein's school ;  it  is  one  of  the  few  books  of  this  de- 
cadent time  that  show  a  promise  of  better  things. 

It  was  perhaps  the  best  that  could  have  happened 
for  the  ultimate  regeneration  of  the  nation  that  in  this 
century  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War,  when  a  popular  or 
national  literature  was  impossible,  the  Germans  should 
have  looked  abroad  for  their  poetic  inspiration.  But  in 
the  fifty  years  that  elapsed  between  the  Peace  of  West- 
phalia and  the  close  of  the  century,  the  progress  of  their 
literature  was  disappointingly  slow  :  it  remained  for  the 
eighteenth  century  to  make  clear  that  Renaissance  models 
alone  could  not  effect  the  salvation  of  German  poetry. 


99 


CHAPTER   X. 

FRENCH    CLASSICISM    AND    ENGLISH    NATURALISM. 

THE  eighteenth  century  in  the  intellectual  development 
of  Europe  presents  a  Janus-like  aspect :  it  looks  both 
backwards  and  forwards.  On  the  one  hand,  it  carries 
the  literary  movement  inaugurated  by  the  Renaissance 
and  the  spiritual  revival  associated  with  the  Reformation, 
to  a  higher  and  highest  point ;  and,  on  the  other,  it 
is  the  century  in  which  the  leading  nations  of  Europe, 
England,  France,  Germany,  one  after  the  other,  discovered, 
by  virtue  of  a  return  to  nature  and  to  unfettered  modes  of 
thought,  their  true  selves.  Thus  it  is  at  the  same  time 
the  century  of  classicism  and  rationalism,  and  the  century 
of  individualism  and  sentimentalism.  In  England  and 
France  these  two  movements  stand  in  more  or  less  acute 
antagonism  to  each  other,  and  it  was  Germany's  mission  to 
effect  a  reconciliation  between  them.  In  German  thought 
and  poetry  we  are  able  to  discern  a  steady  endeavour  to 
overcome  the  dual  character  of  the  century,  a  move- 
ment towards  a  classicism  which  afforded  room  for  in- 
dividual expansion  and  towards  a  humanism  which  com- 
bined the  clear  vision  of  the  "  Aufklarung  "  with  a  noble 
idealism. 

It  is  difficult  to  find  a  definite  starting-point  for  the 
literary  movement  of  the  eighteenth  century.  The  his- 
torian of  English  literature  usually  begins  his  study  of  the 
period  with  the  Restoration,  that  is  to  say,  forty  years  too 
early ;  the  German,  on  the  other  hand,  is  rather  tempted 
to  postpone  what  he  calls  eighteenth-century  literature 


1OO      FRENCH  CLASSICISM  AND  ENGLISH  NATURALISM. 

until  after  the  year  1740.  That  year  marks  an  epoch 
both  in  German  political  history — it  was  the  date  of 
Frederick  the  Great's  accession  to  the  throne  of  Prussia 
and  of  Maria  Theresa's  to  that  of  Austria — and  in  the  his- 
tory of  German  literature  ;  in  1740  took  place  the  famous 
literary  battle  between  Gottsched  in  Leipzig,  the  champion 
of  French  classicism,  and  Bodmer  and  Breitinger  the  two 
Zurich  critics  who  won  the  first  victories  for  English 
naturalism  on  the  continent. 

The  literature  of  the  previous  forty  years  of  the 
eighteenth  century  in  Germany  is  imitative  and  unin- 
spired. Completely  overshadowed  by  the  French  seven- 
teenth century,  it  is,  one  might  say,  the  German  equivalent 
of  that  stage  in  the  evolution  of  Renaissance  ideas  which 
found  its  complete  expression  in  the  "  grand  siecle " 
of  Louis  XIV.  The  group  of  North  German  poets,  the 
so-called  "  Hofpoeten  " — Rudolf  von  Canitz  (1654-99), 
Benjamin  Neukirch  (1665-1729),  Johann  von  Besser 
(1654-1729),  J.  V.  Pietsch  (1690-1733).  J.  U.  von  Konig 
(1688-1744) — who  set  themselves  up  in  opposition  to 
Hofmannswaldau  and  Lohenstein,  were  only  superior  to 
these  poets  in  their  better  taste  and  avoidance  of  bom- 
bast. For  the  rest,  they  pinned  their  faith  on  Boileau  and 
were  but  mediocrely  endowed  with  poetic  talent.  To 
this  circle  belonged,  however,  one  inspired  lyric  poet, 
Johann  Christian  Giinther  (1695-1723),  whose  unhappy 
life  was  cut  short  at  the  age  of  twenty-eight.  Giinther's 
lyrics — his  first  collection  of  Gedichte  appeared  in  1724 — 
show  a  felicity  of  expression  and  smoothness  of  rhythm 
worthy  of  his  best  predecessors  in  the  seventeenth  century, 
Dach  and  Fleming,  and  an  emotional  sincerity  which 
foreshadows  the  lyric  of  Klopstock  and  Goethe.  But 
Giinther  was  an  exception  and,  at  his  best,  has  little  in 
common  with  the  pseudo  -  classic  "court  poets,"  with 
whom  he  is  associated. 

The  chief  representative  of  this  North  German  class- 
icism on  the  French  model  was  Johann  Christoph  Gott- 
sched, who  was  born  at  Judithenkirch,  near  Konigsberg, 
in  1700,  and  found  his  way  at  the  age  of  twenty-four  to 


GOTTSCHED.  IOI 

Leipzig,  which  was  at  that  time  the  intellectual  metropolis 
of  Germany.  As  a  member,  and  later  as  the  "Senior" 
of  the  "  Deutschiibende  Gesellschaft  "  in  Leipzig,  and  as 
the  editor  of  several  periodicals,  he  rapidly  made  his  way 
to  the  front;  and  in  1730,  his  Versuch  einer  Kritischeri 
Dichtkunst,  a  practical  treatise  embodying  the  pseudo- 
classic  dogmas  of  literary  composition,  established  his 
right  to  speak  with  authority.  From  theory  Gottsched 
passed  to  practice ;  he  succeeded  in  enlisting  the  sym- 
pathies of  the  best  theatrical  company  of  the  time  for  his 
ideas,  that  at  the  head  of  which  stood  Johann  and 
Karoline  Neuber,  and  with  their  assistance  he  declared 
war  on  the  crude  melodramatic  "  Haupt-  und  Staats- 
aktionen,"  then  popular,  and  established  the  masterpieces 
of  the  French  classical  drama  on  the  German  stage ;  he 
insisted  on  the  actors  avoiding  bombastic  rant  and  vulgar 
buffoonery,  and  thereby  brought  the  theatre  into  touch,  as 
it  had  hardly  ever  been  before  in  Germany,  with  literature. 
This  was  a  great  point  gained,  even  if  Gottsched's  zeal 
for  French  ideals  led  him  to  neglect  elements  in  the 
native  drama  which  were  worthy  of  development.  Gott- 
sched's main  task  was  to  provide  the  theatre  with  plays, 
and  between  1740  and  1745  he  published  six  volumes 
entitled  Deutsche  Schaubiihne  nach  den  Regeln  der  alten 
Griechen  und  Romer  eingerichtet,  which  contained  mainly 
translations  from  the  French.  He  himself  .wrote  an 
original  tragedy  Der  sterbende  Cato  (1732),  based  partly 
on  a  French  play  by  J.  Deschamps  and  partly  on  that 
by  Addison ;  in  spite  of  its  indifferent  merit,  Gottsched's 
tragedy  held  the  German  stage  for  many  years.  Gott- 
sched had  little  or  no  creative  genius,  but  his  wife,  Luise 
Adelgunde  Gottsched  (1713-62),  was  the  author  of  several 
excellent  comedies  which  enjoyed  deserved  popularity. 

This  varied  activity  between  1730  and  1740  brought 
Gottsched's  reputation  to  a  culminating  point ;  he  was 
generally  recognised  as  the  privileged  dictator  of  German 
letters.  In  1740,  however,  the  blow  fell;  a  new  move- 
ment in  German  criticism  arose,  championed  by  two  Swiss 
critics,  Bodmer  and  Breitinger,  and  in  the  virulent  contro- 


102      FRENCH  CLASSICISM  AND  ENGLISH  NATURALISM. 

versy  that  ensued,  Gottsched  was  completely  discredited. 
So  disastrous  indeed  was  his  defeat  that,  although 
he  lived  till  1766,  he  sank  almost  into  obscurity,  all 
the  less  deserved  when  it  is  remembered  that  after  1740 
he  published  works  of  such  solid  merit  as  his  Grundle- 
gung  einer  deutschen  Sprachkunst  (1748),  which  helped 
materially  to  normalise  the  German  literary  language 
of  the  eighteenth  century,  and  his  still  valuable  Notiger 
Vorrat  zur  Geschichte  der  deutschen  dramatischen  Dicht- 
kunst  (1757-65). 

Before  dealing  with  Gottsched's  opponents,  we  must 
return  to  the  beginning  of  the  century  and  trace  the 
beginnings  of  that  new  spirit  which  was  ultimately  to 
dislodge  French  pseudo  -  classicism.  Even  before  the 
close  of  the  seventeenth  century,  a  freer  breath  passed 
over  German  intellectual  life ;  the  harsh  dogmatism  of 
Lutheranism  gave  way  before  the  emotional  appeal  of 
pietism,  the  first  and  greatest  representative  of  which  was 
Philipp  Jakob  Spener  (1635-1705),  an  Alsatian  preacher 
and  the  author  of  the  text-book  of  the  new  faith,  the  Desi- 
deria  pia,  oder  herzliches  Verlangen  nach  gottgefdlliger  Bes- 
serung  der  wahren  evangelischen  Kirche  (1680).  And  in 
the  train  of  this  religious  revival  came  a  fresh  outburst  of 
religious  song,  which  showed  that  the  traditions  of  the 
preceding  century  had  not  died  out.  To  pietism  we  owe 
the  still  familiar  hymns  of  Spener  himself,  of  J.  Neander 
(1650-80),  G.  Tersteegen  (1697-1769),  and  N.  L.  von 
Zinzendorf  (1700-60),  the  founder  of  the  sect  of 
"  Herrnhuter  "  or  Moravian  Brethren. 

Meanwhile,  the  influence  of  Hobbes  and  the  English 
deists  was  gradually  making  its  way  into  Germany ;  and  in 
its  train  rationalism  advanced  rapidly,  holding  the  bal- 
ance at  the  universities  with  pietism.  Christian  Thomasius 
(1655-1728),  the  pioneer  of  the  new  philosophy,  delivered 
at  Leipzig  in  the  winter  of  1687-88  the  first  course  of 
university  lectures  in  the  German  tongue,  and  about  the 
same  time  published  a  German  monthly  journal,  Scherz- 
und  ernsthafte,  vernilnftige  und  einfdltige  Gedanken  iiber 
allerhand  lustige  und  niltzliche  Biicher  und  Fragen. 


THOMASIUS,    LEIBNIZ,    AND    WOLFF.  103 

Greater  than  Thomasius  was  his  younger  fellow-townsman, 
Gottfried  Wilhelm  Leibniz  (1646-1716),  the  first  German 
philosopher  whose  influence  was  European.  Leibniz's 
historical  significance  is  due  to  the  fact  that  he  definitely 
destroyed  the  formal  philosophic  systems  of  the  mediaeval 
schools.  His  own  system,  which  he  expounded  in  Latin 
and  French  treatises  (Nouveaux  essais  sitr  fentendement 
Aumam,  1704;  -Essais  de  Theodicee  sur  la  bonte  de  Dieu, 
la  liberte  de  fhomme  et  forigine  du  mat,  1710,  and 
Monadologie,  1714),  was  based  on  the  results  arrived  at 
by  Locke  in  England  and  Bayle  in  France ;  but  Leibniz 
attacked  the  problems  from  a  less  materialistic  standpoint. 
The  dualism  between  matter  and  spirit,  which  the  philo- 
sophy of  the  eighteenth  century  attempted  again  and 
again  to  bridge  over,  was  explained  in  Leibniz's  system 
by  an  ingenious  hypothesis  of  pre-established  harmony 
between  the  two ;  matter  consisted,  according  to  him,  of 
so-called  "monads,"  which  were  not  merely  endowed 
individually  with  the  qualities  of  matter,  but  had  at  the 
same  time  a  certain  spiritual  potency.  In  his  native 
tongue  Leibniz  wrote  but  little,  but  he  advocated  its  use 
with  persistency  and  warmth — notably  in  his  Unvorgreif- 
liche  Gedanken  betreffend  die  Ausilbung  und  Verbesserung 
der  teutschen  Sprache  (1697)  —  and  was  one  of  the  chief 
founders  of  the  Berlin  Academy  in  1700.  He  laid, 
one  might  say,  the  basis  of  modern  German  culture ; 
above  all,  he  gave  the  German  "Aufklarung"  its  character- 
istically optimistic  tone.  He  was  not,  however,  a  practical 
thinker  who  reacted  immediately  on  his  nation  or  its 
literature ;  that  was  the  work  of  his  successor,  Christian 
Wolff  (1679-1  754),  who,  as  professor  in  Halle,  carried  on 
and  completed  the  rationalistic  movement  inaugurated  by 
Thomasius  and  Leibniz.  Without  the  originality  of 
either  of  these  men,  Wolff  possessed  a  remarkably  practi- 
cal mind  ;  he  reduced  the  new  philosophy  to  a  system 
(  Vernilnftige  Gedanken  von  Gott,  der  Welt  und  der  Seele 
des  Menschen,  1720),  and  by  virtue  of  his  immediate 
appeal  to  his  time  became  pre-eminently,  as  Hegel  said, 
the  "teacher  of  the  Germans." 


IO4     FRENCH  CLASSICISM  AND  ENGLISH  NATURALISM. 

The  philosophic  movement  contributed  in  no  small 
degree  towards  bringing  England  and  Germany  closer  to- 
gether at  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  and  beginning  of  the 
eighteenth  century.  And  it  was  not  unnatural  that  the  first 
avenue  by  which  English  influence  found  its  way  to  the 
continent  should  have  passed  through  Hamburg.  North 
German  philosophers  and  theologians  had  been  constantly 
drawing  attention  to  how  much  Germany  had  to  learn 
from  England,  and  the  younger  literary  generation  in 
Hamburg  soon  followed  up  their  suggestions.  The  way 
was  prepared  by  a  satirist  of  no  mean  gifts,  Christian 
Wernigke  (1661-1725),  who  brought  the  Hamburg  poets 
of  Hofmannswaldau's  school  into  discredit.  His  best 
epigrams,  indeed,  are  hardly  inferior  to  those  of  Logau 
in  the  previous  century.  And  in  Hamburg  were  born 
two  poets  who  shared  the  honour  of  introducing  English 
literary  ideas  into  German  poetry,  and  laying  the  found- 
ation for  the  new  literary  movement.  These  were  Barthold 
Heinrich  Brockes  (1680-1747)  and  Friedrich  von  Hagedorn 
(1708-54).  The  former,  who  began  in  the  school  of 
Hofmannswaldau,  has  small  intrinsic  worth  as  a  poet ; 
he  came,  however,  at  an  early  date  under  the  influence  of 
Pope's  pastorals,  and  found  in  this  model  a  congenial 
vehicle  for  his  own  passionate  love  of  nature.  His  original 
poetry  began  to  appear  in  1721  under  the  title  Irdisches 
Vergniigen  in  Gott,  of  which  by  1748  nine  volumes  had 
appeared.  There  is  little  that  is  inspired  in  these  volumes, 
but  Brockes's  enthusiasm  leavened  all  that  came  after ; 
he  achieved  what  his  English  contemporary  Thomson, 
whose  Seasons  he  translated,  had  achieved  in  England  : 
he  emancipated  the  senses,  and  voiced  the  growing  en- 
thusiasm for  nature. 

Hagedorn  is  in  every  respect  a  greater  poet  than 
Brockes,  but  it  may  be  questioned  if  his  influence  was 
proportionate  to  his  merits.  He,  too,  came  under 
English  influence,  for  he  had  lived  for  several  years  in 
London  as  secretary  to  the  Danish  embassy,  and  in  later 
life  he  kept  in  constant  touch  with  England.  But  the 
poets  who  attracted  him  in  England  were  rather  those 


INFLUENCE    OF    THE    ENGLISH    WEEKLIES.       IO5 

who  had  been  schooled  in  French  classicism  than  the 
pioneers  of  naturalism.  Apart  from  the  lesson  of  form 
and  style — and  this  lesson  must  not  be  underrated — Hage- 
dorn  had  little  to  give  to  German  poetry  that  was  vital 
to  its  progress.  He  had  a  sunny,  happy  nature,  which 
revelled  in  the  light  social  tone  of  the  anacreontic,  as  it 
was  cultivated  in  France  at  this  time  ;  and  in  his  admir- 
able Fabeln  und  Erzdhlungen  (1738-50),  he  proved  himself 
a  worthy  German  successor  of  Lafontaine. 

English  literature  first  became  widely  popular  in 
Germany  with  the  introduction  of  the  English  weekly 
journal  on  the  model  of  the  Tatler,  Spectator,  and 
Guardian.  Here,  again,  Hamburg  led  the  way.  As  early 
as  1713,  Der  Vermin/tier  had  appeared  there,  a  periodical 
which  consisted  mainly  of  translations  from  the  English 
weeklies.  In  the  years  1721-23  Bodmer  and  Breitinger 
published  their  Diskurse  der  Maler  in  Zurich,  while 
Gottsched  also  copied  the  English  models  in  Die  vernilnf- 
tigen  Tadlerinnen  (1725-26)  and  Der  Biedermann  (1727). 
The  best  example  of  the  German  "moralische  Wochen- 
schrift "  is,  however,  Der  Patriot,  which  appeared  in 
Hamburg  between  1724  and  1726.  This  form  of  litera- 
ture took  even  a  firmer  hold  upon  the  German  people  than 
upon  the  English,  and  continued  popular  on  the  continent 
until  long  past  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century.  In 
England  the  moral  weekly  was  a  testimony  to  the  rising 
influence  of  the  middle  classes,  but  in  Germany  it  had 
at  the  same  time  a  very  definite  mission  :  it  became  the 
accepted  organ  of  popular  education,  the  vehicle  by  means 
of  which  the  Wolffian  philosophy  was  rendered  palatable 
to  the  nation  at  large. 

Hardly  less  influential  than  the  Spectator  was  another 
great  English  book  in  the  early  years  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  Defoe's  Robinson  Crusoe  (1719).  While  in 
England  the  significantly  modern  note  in  this  novel  was 
at  once  recognised,  the  continent  saw  in  it  rather  the 
culmination  of  the  form  of  romance  which  had  dominated 
European  literature  in  the  seventeenth  century.  Ger- 
many especially  regarded  it  as  the  development  of  a 


106     FRENCH  CLASSICISM  AND  ENGLISH  NATURALISM. 

kind  of  story,  of  which  she  had  already  had  an  example 
in  the  latter  part  of  Simplidssimus.  Robinson  Crusoe  was 
at  once  translated  into  German,  and  within  a  very  few 
years  had  called  forth  an  extraordinary  flood  of  imita- 
tions. We  find  not  merely  a  Teutscher  Robinson,  a  Franzo- 
sischer  Robinson,  but  every  country  in  Germany  had  its 
own  Robinson  —  The  Swiss  Family  Robinson,  by  J.  R. 
Wyss,  which  is  still  familiar  to  us,  dates  from  the  beginning 
of  the  nineteenth  century;  the  list  includes  further  a 
Geistlicher  Robinson  and  a  Medizinischer  Robinson,  and  even 
zjungfer  Robinsonin ;  but  many  of  these,  it  ought  in 
fairness  to  be  added,  are  only  "  Robinsonaden  "  in  name. 
Best  of  all  is  Die  Insel  Felsenburg,  written  by  J.  G.  Schna- 
bel,  and  published  in  four  volumes  between  1731  and 
1743.  Here  the  motives  familiar  from  Defoe's  romance 
are  weakened  by  repetition  and  over  -  emphasis ;  the 
author  is  more  intent  on  demonstrating  the  rise  of  an 
ideal  state  under  the  conditions  of  nature  than  in  depict- 
ing, like  Defoe,  the  realistic  struggle  of  man  against  nature's 
powers.  But  the  novel  is  written  graphically  and  vividly 
and — as  modernised  by  Tieck  in  Germany  and  Oehlen- 
schlager  in  Denmark — it  maintained  its  popularity  until 
late  in  the  nineteenth  century. 

As  in  Reformation  times,  Switzerland  responded  most 
quickly  to  this  stimulus  from  without ;  and  the  gospel 
of  naturalism  which  came  from  England,  soon  found  en- 
thusiastic adherents  there.  Among  the  pioneers  of  the 
new  literature,  Albrecht  von  Haller  is  usually  regarded 
as  the  Swiss  complement  of  Hagedorn  ;  but  Haller,  who 
was  born  at  Bern  in  1708  and  died  in  1777,  was  much 
more  a  poet  of  the  coming  time  than  his  Hamburg  con- 
temporary. His  writings  have  none  of  the  winning  grace 
of  Hagedorn's  verse,  but  his  two  didactic  poems,  Die 
A/pen  and  Uber  den  Ursprung  des  Ubels,  both  published 
for  the  first  time  in  the  second  edition  of  his  Versnch 
schweizerischer  Gedichte  (i  734),  reveal  a  grander  imagin- 
ation than  Hagedorn  possessed  :  and  his  appreciation  for 
nature  in  her  wilder  and  sterner  moods,  struck  a  new 
note  in  the  continental  literature  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 


BODMER    AND    BREITINGER.  107 

tury.  In  his  old  age  Haller  wrote  novels  with  didactic 
tendencies  (Usong,  1771  ;  Alfred,  Konig  der  Angelsachsen, 
X773)>  and,  as  professor  in  Gottingen,  was  one  of  the 
leading  anatomists  and  physiologists  of  his  century. 

It  was  from  Switzerland,  too,  that  the  movement 
emanated  before  which  Gottsched  and  pseudo-classicism 
ultimately  succumbed  in  Germany.  This  movement  was 
also  English,  for  its  theory  was  based  on  the  Spectator, 
its  practice  on  Milton.  Gottsched's  principal  Swiss 
opponents,  Johann  Jakob  Bodmer  (1698-1783)  and 
Johann  Jakob  Breitinger  (1701-76),  were  theorists  and 
scholars  rather  than  poets  ;  the  latter,  indeed,  restricted 
himself  entirely  to  criticism,  and  Bodmer's  original  poetry, 
his  epics,  such  as  Noah  (1750),  hardly  detract  from  the 
truth  of  this  statement.  In  later  years  Bodmer  helped  to 
awaken  interest  in  German  mediaeval  literature  with  a  mod- 
ernisation of  the  Nibelungenlied(Chriemhilden  Rache,  1757) 
and  with  his  collection  of  the  Minnesinger  (1758-59). 
The  two  friends  began  their  joint  activity  in  1721  in  the 
journal  already  mentioned,  Die  Diskurse  der  Maler,  and 
in  1732  Bodmer  published  a  prose  translation  of  Paradise 
Lout,  prefaced  by  a  short  eulogy  of  the  English  poet  and 
his  rhymeless  verse.  Gottsched  in  Leipzig  did  not  alto- 
gether approve  of  this,  but  it  was  not  until  Breitinger  pub- 
lished his  Kritische  Dichtkimst,  and  Bodmer  his  Kritische 
Abhand lung  von  dem  Wunderbaren  in  der  Poesie  in  1740, 
that  the  actual  quarrel  with  the  leader  of  French  taste 
broke  out.  In  1741  Bodmer  followed  up  his  treatise 
with  a  second,  Betrachtungen  iiber  die  poetischen  Gemdldc 
der  Dichter.  At  first  sight,  it  would  not  seem  as  if  there 
was  much  room  for  antagonism  between  the  two  parties, 
and,  indeed,  in  the  essentials  of  poetic  theory  both  sides 
were  fairly  well  agreed.  The  real  point  at  issue  was 
whether,  as  Gottsched  insisted,  reason  should  be  the 
dominating  force  in  poetic  creation,  or,  as  his  opponents 
said,  imagination  ;  Gottsched  believed  in  the  poet  sub- 
mitting himself  to  certain  artificial  laws  deduced  from 
classic  writers ;  Bodmer  and  Breitinger,  while  by  no 
means  despising  laws,  left  room  for  the  poet  to  exercise 


108      FRENCH  CLASSICISM  AND  ENGLISH  NATURALISM. 

more  freely  his  imagination.  This  explains  why  the 
hottest  part  of  the  controversy  centred  in  the  question 
as  to  how  far  the  "  miraculous  "  was  a  legitimate  element 
in  poetic  expression. 

The  battle  had  not  raged  long  before  it  was  evident 
that  Gottsched's  cause  was  lost  ;  not  that  his  adversaries 
were  superior  to  him,  for  he  and  his  henchmen  were 
intellectually,  and  even  as  poets,  more  than  a  match 
for  the  Zurich  party,  but  the  spirit  of  the  age  was  against 
him.  Bodmer  and  Breitinger  triumphed,  and  with  them 
the  influence  of  English  literature,  not  because  they  fought 
particularly  well,  but  because  the  day  of  undiluted  and 
unmodified  pseudo-classicism  was  over. 


log 


CHAPTER    XI. 

SAXON    AND    PRUSSIAN    LITERARY    CIRCLES  ;    KLOPSTOCK. 

IN  the  present  chapter  we  have  to  consider  the  condition 
of  German  literature  in  the  years  subsequent  to  the 
decisive  controversy  between  Gottsched  and  the  Swiss 
in  1740  and  1741.  The  immediate  effect  of  Gottsched's 
defeat  was  naturally  most  noticeable  among  his  own  friends 
and  disciples  in  Leipzig,  the  young  men  who  had  helped 
him  to  translate  French  dramas  and  Bayle's  Dictionary. 
These  writers,  although  not  openly  disloyal  to  Gottsched, 
were  influenced  by  the  new  ideas,  and  felt  the  need  of 
a  more  liberal  organ  than  the  Belustigungen  des  Verstandes 
und  des  Witzes,  in  which  their  contributions  had  hitherto 
appeared;  and  in  1744  they  founded  a  new  monthly, 
which,  owing  to  the  fact  that  it  was  published  in  Bremen, 
was  called  the  Bremer  Beitrdge  (1744-48).  Of  the 
writers  of  this  circle,  K.  C.  Gartner  (1712-91),  J.  A. 
Cramer  (1723-88),  J.  Adolf  Schlegel  (1721-93)— father 
of  the  brothers  Schlegel  who  became  the  chief  critics 
of  the  Romantic  School — and  J.  A.  Ebert  (1723-95),  who 
translated  extensively  from  the  English,  are  of  small 
importance  ;  but  four  members  of  the  group,  Elias  Schlegel, 
Zacharia,  Rabener,  and  Gellert,  deserve  more  detailed 
consideration. 

Although  not  perhaps  the  most  talented,  Johann  Elias 
Schlegel  (1719-49),  whose  promising  career  was  cut  short 
at  the  age  of  thirty,  meant  most  for  the  future  develop- 
ment of  German  poetry.  His  alexandrine  tragedies 
(Hermann,  1743;  Canut,  1747)  were  the  most  original 


110       SAXON    AND    PRUSSIAN    LITERARY    CIRCLES. 

that  the  school  produced,  and  his  comedies  (Die  stumme 
Schonheit,  1747;  Der  Triumph  der  giiten  Frauen,  1748) 
the  best  to  be  seen  on  the  German  stage  before  Lessing, 
with  the  possible  exception  of  an  admirable  local  comedy 
of  Hamburg  life,  Der  Bookesbeutel  (1742),  by  Hinrich 
Borkenstein.  In  his  dramaturgic  theories  Schlegel  was 
distinctly  a  forerunner  of  Lessing ;  he  recognised  that 
the  Greeks  were  worthier  masters  to  imitate  than  the 
French  ;  he  discussed  the  establishment  of  a  permanent 
national  theatre,  and  had  even  a  word  to  say  in  favour 
of  Shakespeare,  whose  Julius  Caesar  was,  in  1741,  trans- 
lated into  alexandrines  by  the  Prussian  ambassador  in 
London, .  K.  W.  von  Borck. 

J.  F.  W.  Zacharia  (1726-77)  helped,  like  Ebert,  to 
introduce  English  literature  into  Germany — he  translated 
Milton's  Paradise  Lost :  in  1760 — but  his  tastes  lay  rather 
in  the  direction  of  English  classicism  than  of  the  new 
literary  ideals  towards  which  Germany  was  blindly  grop- 
ing. He  is  remembered  almost  solely  by  his  admirable 
comic  epic  Der  Renommist  (1744),  which  was  modelled 
partly  on  Boileau's  Lutrin,  and  partly  on  Pope's  Rape  of 
the  Lock.  The  hero  is  a  student  who  comes  from  the 
rough,  unpolished  university  of  Jena  to  Leipzig,  the 
metropolis  of  good  taste,  where  he  falls  under  the  charm 
of  a  Leipzig  beauty,  becomes  himself  a  dandy,  only  to 
be  laughed  at  and  rejected  by  the  lady  for  a  more 
favoured  townsman  of  her  own.  The  argument  of  the 
poem  is  trite  enough,  but  Zacharia  gives  an  interesting 
glimpse  into  the  Leipzig  to  which  Lessing  came  as  a 
student. 

More  gifted  than  Zacharia  was  Gottlieb  Wilhelm  Rab- 
ener  (1714-71),  who,  educated  at  the  school  of  St  Afra 
in  Meissen  and  at  the  university  of  Leipzig,  became  a 
revenue  inspector  at  Leipzig  and  Dresden.  His  writings 
are  not  voluminous,  being  all  comprised  in  four  small 
volumes,  Sammlung  satirischer  Schriften,  which  appeared 
between  1751  and  1755.  Rabener  is  a  prose  satirist  of 
a  peculiarly  gentle  and  harmless  type ;  politics  and  the 
wider  issues  of  social  life  he  eschews  altogether,  and  the 


RABENER  AND  GELLERT.  Ill 

raillery  which  he  expends  on  provincial  vagaries  and 
eccentricities  is  always  mingled  with  a  didactic  desire  to 
improve.  His  own  genial  personality  is  reflected  in  his 
satire,  and  his  prose  style  has  a  charm  unusual  at  so  early 
a  period.  If  Rabener  was  more  humorist  than  satirist, 
C.  L.  Liscow  (1701-60)  was  a  satirist  without  much 
humour ;  his  collection  of  Satirische  und  ernsthafte 
Schriften  (1739)  is  more  akin  to  the  kind  of  writing  we 
associate  with  Swift,  but  as  his  satire  was  for  the  most  part 
directed  against  the  obscurer  writers  of  the  day,  it  soon 
lost  its  interest.  A.  G.  Kastner  (1719-1800),  professor 
of  mathematics  at  Gottingen,  has  also  to  be  mentioned 
here  as  a  sharp-tongued  and  witty  epigrammatist. 

As  far  as  popularity  was  concerned,  the  first  place 
among  the  contributors  to  the  Bremer  Beitrdge  belongs 
to  Christian  Fiirchtegott  Gellert  (1715-69).  Educated, 
like  Rabener,  in  Meissen  and  Leipzig,  he  became  in  1744 
a  " privatdozent "  and  in  1751  professor  in  the  university. 
As  a  teacher,  his  favourite  theme  was  the  relationship  of 
literature  and  morals,  and  his  moral  guidance  and  advice 
was  eagerly  sought  by  all  classes  of  people.  His  books 
found  their  way  into  circles  where  previously  only  the 
Bible  and  the  hymn-book  had  been  read ;  he  taught  the 
German  middle  classes  what  serious  literature  meant. 
Gellert  is  the  typical  product  of  the  Wolffian  philosophy 
as  it  manifested  itself  in  literature ;  he  realised  better  than 
any  other  man  of  his  time  the  educative  mission  of  litera- 
ture which  Wolff  and  Gottsched  had  at  heart.  As  a 
playwright,  Gellert  wrote  a  few  comedies — the  best  being 
perhaps  Das  Los  in  der  Lotterie  (174?) — which,  without 
making  pretensions  to  higher  dramatic  significance,  re- 
produce faithfully  the  social  life  of  the  time ;  and  in  an 
academic  address  he  advocated  the  imitation  of  the 
comedie  larmoyante  of  Nivelle  de  la  Chaussee,  a  type 
of  play  which,  as  will  be  seen,  was  all-important  for  the 
subsequent  development  of  the  German  drama.  In 
fiction,  he  was  also  a  pioneer,  for  his  one  novel,  Leben 
der  schwedischen  Grdfin  von  G***  (1747-48),  has  the 
distinction  of  being  the  first  German  novel  inspired  by 


112       SAXON    AND    PRUSSIAN    LITERARY    CIRCLES. 

Richardson.  It  is  true,  the  result  is  of  rather  a  hybrid 
character,  Gellert  being  unable  to  dispense  with  the  sen- 
sational elements  of  the  older  fiction  ;  and,  in  spite  of  its 
sententiousness,  his  book  can  hardly  be  regarded  as  in- 
culcating virtue.  His  didactic  aims  were  more  effectively 
realised  in  his  collection  of  model  letters  (Briefe,  nebst 
einer  praktischen  Abhandlung  von  dem  guten  Geschmack 
in  Brief  en,  1751),  which  were  accepted  as  models  for 
German  letter-writing  by  more  than  one  generation. 

Gellert's  greatest  achievement,  however,  was  his  Fabeln 
und  Erzdhlungen  (1746-48),  the  only  book  of  that  time 
which  still  remains  popular  to-day.  Grace  and  simplicity, 
not  poetic  insight  or  imagination,  are  the  characteristics 
of  Gellert's  poetry.  Lafontaine  is  his  model,  but  he  Ger- 
manises Lafontaine  as  completely  as  he  had  Germanised 
Richardson  in  his  novel ;  his  milieu  is  the  unidealised  daily 
life  around  him,  and  the  didactic  point  of  his  story  is  care- 
fully adjusted  to  German  conditions.  With  his  Geistliche 
Oden  und  Lieder  (1757),  again,  he  satisfied  the  religious 
needs  of  his  contemporaries  as  in  the  earlier  collection 
he  had  satisfied  their  poetic  needs.  It  is,  however,  mainly 
as  a  fable-writer  that  Gellert  is  remembered,  and  he  and 
Hagedorn  supplied  the  models  for  the  succeeding  genera- 
tion of  fable-writers,  of  whom  M.  G.  Lichtwer  (1719-83) 
and  G.  K.  Pfeffel  (1736-1809)  are  worthy  of  mention. 
Lessing,  on  the  other  hand,  whose  Fabeln  appeared  in 
I759>  brought  back  the  fable  to  the  concrete,  sharply 
focussed  form  of  the  ancients. 

The  Bremer  Beitrage  numbered  amongst  its  contribu- 
tors a  greater  writer  than  either  Rabener  or  Gellert,  but 
one  who  proved  too  strong  for  the  school,  whose  first 
important  contribution  to  the  journal  was  disastrous  to  it. 
In  the  spring  of  1748,  cantos  i.-ni.  of  Klopstock's  Messias 
were  published  in  the  Beitrdge  and  opened  a  new  era  in 
German  poetry.  Before,  however,  turning  to  Klopstock 
it  is  necessary  to  look  at  the  condition  of  literature 
in  Prussia,  and,  above  all,  in  the  two  centres,  Halle 
and  Berlin,  in  the  early  years  of  Frederick  the  Great's 
reign. 


LITERATURE    IN    HALL]'..  113 

Although  the  headquarters  of  the  opposing  parties  in 
the  battle  between  classicism  and  naturalism  were  Leipzig 
and  Zurich,  Gottsched's  enemies  had  an  advance-post  in 
much  closer  proximity,  namely  at  Halle,  where  the  new 
university,  founded  in  1694,  already  stood  in  the  vanguard 
of  German  thought.  Pietism  and  rationalism  successively 
looked  to  Halle  for  guidance,  and  between  1735  ar)d  1 74°, 
A.  G.  Baumgarten  (1714-62)  was  a  teacher  in  the  univer- 
sity there  ;  on  the  basis  of  the  poetic  theories  of  Bodmer 
and  Breitinger,  that  thinker  laid  the  foundations  of  a  new 
department  of  philosophy — aesthetics.  It  was  thus  only 
natural  that  the  students  of  Halle  should  have  turned 
rather  to  Zurich  than  to  Leipzig,  and  received  the  Swiss 
theories  with  more  respect  than  Gottsched's. 

Of  the  Halle  or  Prussian  group  of  poets,  the  two  oldest 
were  Immanuel  Jakob  Pyra  (1715-44)  and  Samuel  Gott- 
hold  Lange  (1711-81).  The  former,  who  died  at  the  age 
of  twenty-nine,  was  a  warm  admirer  of  Milton,  whose  in- 
fluence is  to  be  traced  on  all  his  poetry ;  while  Lange  at- 
tempted, with  much  less  inspiration,  to  combine  the  fervid 
language  of  the  Bible  with  the  grace  of  the  Horatian  ode. 
In  1737  they  wrote  together  in  rhymeless  verse,  Thyrsis 
ttnd  Damons  freundschaftliche  Lieder,  which,  however,  were 
not  published  until  after  Pyra's  death  in  1745.  These 
Lieder  were  the  immediate  forerunners  of  Klopstock's 
lyric  poetry. 

The  common  tie  which  united  the  members  of  the 
younger  group  of  Halle  poets,  Gleim,  Uz,  and  Gotz,  was 
the  anacreontic,  a  form  of  verse  which  had  already  been 
made  popular  by  Hagedorn.  J.  W.  L.  Gleim  (1719- 
1803),  although  but  meagrely  gifted,  was  a  prominent 
literary  personality  of  the  eighteenth  century  ;  for  he  stood 
on  an  intimate  footing  with  all  the  poets  of  his  time.  His 
home  in  Halberstadt  was  a  goal  of  pilgrimage  for  many 
a  young  writer,  who  sought  the  advice  and  commendation 
of  "Vater  Gleim."  His  anacreontic  Scherzhafte  Lieder 
(1744-45)  set  the  example  to  his  younger  colleagues,  and 
his  Preussische  Kriegslieder  von  einem  Grenadier  (1758), 
written  in  the  English  ballad-metre  of  Chevy  Chase,  gave 

H 


114       SAXON    AND    PRUSSIAN    LITERARY    CIRCLES. 

him  a  reputation  as  a  patriotic  poet ;  but  the  Kriegslieder 
have  little  abiding  worth  ;  as  Lessing  said,  the  patriot's 
voice  drowned  the  poet's.  Gleim,  however,  owed  his 
reputation  solely  to  these  songs ;  his  other  poetic  work, 
his  epics  and  imitations  of  the  Minnesang,  are  long  for- 
gotten. The  most  gifted  poet  of  the  group  was  a  native  of 
Ansbach,  Johann  Peter  Uz  (1720-96),  who  also  studied 
in  Halle.  He,  too,  cultivated  the  anacreontic,  and  gave 
it  a  formal  beauty  which  bore  testimony  to  his  industrious 
study  of  Horace  and  the  French  vers  de  societe  ;  but  it  is 
in  his  philosophic  poems  that  he  displays  to  best  advant- 
age his  peculiar  poetic  genius  ;  here  he  is  the  successor  of 
Haller  and  the  direct  forerunner  of  Schiller.  Lastly,  J.  N. 
Gotz  (1721-81),  who  came  from  Worms,  had  perhaps  even 
more  sense  for  poetic  form  than  either  Gleim  or  Uz,  but 
his  verses  flowed  too  easily  from  his  pen,  and  are,  for  the 
most  part,  trivial  and  ephemeral. 

From  Halle  the  literary  movement  inaugurated  by 
these  anacreontic  poets  spread  to  the  Prussian  capital, 
where  it  found  in  the  French  tastes  of  the  court  an  even 
more  favourable  soil.  Frederick  the  Great  (1712-86) 
had  a  very  small  opinion  of  German  literature  ;  Gellert, 
indeed,  was  the  only  poet  for  whom  he  expressed  his 
interest  with  any  warmth,  and  when,  in  1780,  he 
himself  wrote  an  essay  of  German  literature  (De  la 
litterature  alkmande),  he  showed  a  complete  misunder- 
standing for  its  national  characteristics.  But  the  very 
movement  he  condemned  he  had  himself  unwittingly 
called  into  existence  and  fostered ;  if  German  poetry, 
from  Klopstock  to  Goethe,  advanced  by  leaps  and 
bounds,  it  was  largely  due  to  the  confidence  and  the 
patriotism  with  which  Frederick  inspired  his  people ; 
this  French  king,  who  spoke  German  with  difficulty,  and 
looked  at  Europe  with  the  cosmopolitan  eyes  of  the 
eighteenth-century  phihsophe,  laid  the  foundations  of  that 
nationalism  in  German  poetry  which  was  to  find  its  most 
vigorous  expression  in  the  anti  -  classic  movement  of 
"Sturm  und  Drang." 

Frederick's    conception    of  literature   was    most    nearly 


RAMLER    AND    EWALD    VON    KLEIST.  115 

realised  in  the  poetry  of  Karl  Wilhelm  Rainier  (1725-98), 
the  "German  Horace."  Ramler's  lyrics  (Lyrische 
Gedtchte,  1772),  with  their  pedantic  metrical  correct- 
ness, their  carefully  studied  decorum,  were  the  embodi- 
ment of  the  severely  classical  ideals  which  the  Prussian 
king  would  have  liked  to  see  transferred  from  French  to 
German  poetry.  But  these  poems  only  appear  to  us  now 
as  cold  and  insincere  imitations.  In  an  age  like  this, 
which  regarded  the  Horatian  ode  as  the  highest  form 
of  poetic  expression,  it  was  also  little  wonder  that  Anna 
Luise  Karsch,  or,  according  to  the  custom  of  the  time, 
Karschin  (1722-91),  a  protegee  of  Gleim's  and  Ramler's, 
should  have  been  regarded  as  a  "  German  Sappho." 
Frau  Karsch,  whose  Auserlesene  Gedichte  were  published 
in  1763,  had  a  highly  developed  faculty  of  improvisation, 
but  her  talent  was  not  strong  enough  to  assert  itself 
amidst  the  artificial  tastes  of  her  time. 

Among  the  Frederician  poets  there  was  one,  however, 
who  caught  a  glimpse  of  higher  things,  an  officer  in 
Frederick's  army,  Ewald  Christian  von  Kleist  (1715-59). 
Kleist,  too,  had  sat  at  Gleim's  feet,  and  had  begun  by 
writing  anacreontic  verses  ;  but  poetry  was  too  much  a 
matter  of  the  heart  to  him  to  allow  him  to  be  satisfied 
with  mere  exercises  of  ingenuity  and  wit.  In  1749  he 
published  Der  Fruhling,  a  fragment  of  a  descriptive  poem 
suggested  by  Thomson's  Seasons.  A  greater  contrast  to 
the  cold  abstractions  of  the  classic  poetry  of  the  time  it 
would  be  hard  to  imagine.  Kleist  merely  describes  a 
walk  in  4he  country  and  his  own  delight  in  the  beauties 
of  nature ;  but  spring  is  a  veritable  revelation  to  him, 
and  he  looks  to  nature  as  the  healer  of  all  human  woes. 
What  in  Haller's  Alpen  had  been  tentative  and  not  always 
convincing,  has  here  become  a  passionate,  heartfelt 
gospel.  In  1757  and  1758  Kleist  was  in  Leipzig,  where 
he  was  the  intimate  friend  of  Lessing;  and  to  those  years 
belong  the  finely  polished  Ode  an  die  preussische  Armee 
and  the  short  epic  Cissides  und  Parties.  In  August  1759 
he  was  severely  wounded  in  the  battle  of  Kunersdorf,  and 
died  before  assistance  could  reach  him  ;  to  himself  fell 


Il6       SAXON    AND    PRUSSIAN    LITERARY    CIRCLES. 

the  honour  he  had  extolled  in  his  poetry,  a  soldier's 
death  for  his  country. 

The  leading  poet  of  this  epoch,  the  poet  who  realised 
what  so  many  had  been  blindly  groping  after,  the  fulfil- 
ment alike  of  the  critical  and  poetical  demands  of  the 
time,  was  Klopstock.  Friedrich  Gottlieb  Klopstock  was 
born  at  Quedlinburg  on  July  2,  1724,  and  educated  at 
Schulpforta,  where  he  already  planned  and  began  his 
epic  on  the  life  of  Christ.  In  1745  he  went  to  Jena 
to  study  theology,  and  here,  following  the  example  of 
Bodmer  in  his  translation  of  Milton,  he  completed  the 
first  three  cantos  of  Der  Messias  in  prose.  In  the 
following  year  he  exchanged  Jena  for  Leipzig,  where, 
at  Gottsched's  suggestion,  he  turned  his  poem  into 
hexameters,  and  in  this  form  the  three  cantos  appeared 
in  the  Bremer  Beitrcige  in  1748.  Meanwhile  a  number 
of  fervid  odes  to  Leipzig  friends  (collected  under  the  title 
Wingolf)  had  given  Klopstock  a  reputation  as  a  lyric 
poet;  and  in  1748,  as  tutor  at  Langensalza  in  Thuringia, 
he  fell  in  love  with  a  cousin  who  inspired  the  odes  to 
"  Fanny."  Bodmer,  one  of  Klopstock's  first  and  warmest 
admirers,  invited  him  to  visit  Zurich  in  1750.  The  Swiss 
critic,  however,  was  only  prepared  to  find  in  Klopstock 
the  religious  poet,  and  when  the  latter  revealed  himself 
as  not  at  all  averse  to  worldly  pleasures,  Bodmer's 
warmth  cooled  off.  After  nearly  seven  months  in  Switzer- 
land, Klopstock  received  an  invitation  from  the  Danish 
king,  Frederick  V.,  to  settle  in  Copenhagen  and  finish 
the  Messias  there.  On  the  journey  north  he  met  in 
Hamburg  his  future  wife,  Margarete  or  Meta  Moller, 
whom  he  married  in  1754.  With  the  exception  of  a  two 
years'  break,  Copenhagen  remained  Klopstock's  home 
until  1770,  when  he  retired  to  Hamburg.  His  death 
took  place  in  1803. 

The  composition  of  Der  Messias  covers  a  very  wide 
period  of  German  literature,  the  last  cantos  not  appearing 
until  1773,  the  year  that  saw  the  establishment  of  the 
movement  known  as  "Sturm  und  Drang."  In  spite  of 
its  twenty  cantos  and  nearly  twenty  thousand  verses,  the 


KLOPSTOCK'S  "  MESSIAS."  117 

poem  treats  but  a  small  section  of  Christ's  life,  beginning 
with  the  ascent  of  the  Mount  of  Olives.  The  action, 
however,  is  not  limited  to  events  that  take  place  on  earth  ; 
the  heavenly  hosts  play  as  large  a  part  in  the  poem  as  the 
earthly  personages.  In  this  respect  Klopstock  was  only 
following  the  traditional  method  of  the  religious  epic  as 
he  had  found  it  exemplified  in  Milton  ;  but  while  in  the 
grandiose  sweep  of  his  imagination  Klopstock  yielded  to 
none  of  his  predecessors,  he  was  entirely  deficient  in 
dramatic  qualities,  and  in  the  power  of  giving  individual 
life  to  his  characters.  Thus  Der  Messias  is  an  epic  not  of 
action,  but  of  feelings ;  not  of  characters,  but  of  senti- 
ment ;  it  has,  as  has  been  well  said,  more  affinity  with 
the  lyric  oratorios  of  Handel  than  with  Paradise  Lost. 
Even  those  features  of  Klopstock's  poem  that  appeal 
most  to  us  to  -  day,  its  lofty  imagery,  its  grandiose 
imaginative  flights,  its  constant  appeal  to  the  sense  of 
wonder,  pall  on  the  reader  after  a  few  thousand  lines 
— palled,  it  must  be  admitted,  on  the  poet  himself  before 
he  reached  the  end.  The  inspiration  grows  scantier  and 
scantier  as  the  poem  approaches  its  close,  and  it  was 
only  with  difficulty  that  Klopstock  rose  to  a  culmination 
at  all ;  the  opening  episodes  have  more  of  the  sublime 
than  the  closing  scenes,  where  Christ  takes  His  place  on 
the  right  hand  of  God.  German  literature  had  advanced 
too  rapidly  for  Klopstock  ;  he  was  left  behind  long  before 
his  life-work  was  completed,  and  he  instinctively  felt  it. 
What  had  been  a  daring  innovation  in  1748,  was  in  1773 
regarded  as  old-fashioned  by  the  younger  generation  that 
pinned  its  faith  to  the  theatre. 

After  all,  it  is  not  as  an  epic  poet,  but  as  a  lyric  poet 
— even  in  his  epic — that  Klopstock  marked  an  epoch  in 
literary  history ;  the  great  achievements  of  German  poetry 
in  the  eighteenth  century  are  conceivable  without  the 
preparation  of  the  Messias,  but  hardly  without  that  of 
Klopstock's  Oden.  of  which  the  first  collected  edition 
appeared  in  1771^.  These  poems  fall  into  several  groups 
which  show  the  poet's  growth  more  clearly  than  the 
successive  cantos  of  the  epic.  In  the  earliest  of  them,  the 


Il8       SAXON    AND    PRUSSIAN    LITERARY    CIRCLES. 

poems  written  in  Leipzig,  Klopstock  already  shows  himself 
in  advance  of  his  friends ;  in  freeing  the  lyric  from  the 
artificial  restraint  of  rhyme,  so  dear  to  the  anacreontic 
singers,  Klopstock  at  the  same  time  asserted  the  right  of 
poetry  to  express  purely  personal  and  individual  feelings. 
The  antique  metres,  which  he  put  in  the  place  of  the 
simple  rhymed  metres,  were  un-German  enough,  but  the 
form  was  of  little  account  compared  with  the  fact  that 
here,  for  the  first  time  for  centuries,  German  feelings 
were  expressed  with  sincerity  and  free  from  artificial 
conventions.  Klopstock  sang  of  religion,  of  love  — 
passionately  in  the  songs  to  his  cousin,  more  con- 
templatively in  those  to  his  future  wife  ;  he  sang,  in  old 
English  measures,  patriotic  songs,  which  are  much  superior 
to  Gleim's  artificial  jingles ;  his  enthusiasm  for  the 
Germanic  past  inspired  another  group  of  odes,  and  his 
disappointed  hopes  of  what  the  French  Revolution  was 
to  achieve  for  the  world,  still  another.  But  whatever  his 
theme,  the  lyric  which  it  inspired  was,  in  the  best  sense, 
German  and  national. 

Klopstock  has  to  be  discussed  in  a  third  capacity  :  as 
a  dramatist.  He  is  the  author  of  six  plays,  three  on 
religious  story  (Der  Tod  Adams,  1757;  Sa/omo,  1764; 
David,  1772),  three  forming  a  trilogy  on  the  life  of 
Germany's  first  patriot,  Hermann  or  Arminius  (1769-87). 
The  latter,  which  Klopstock  called  "  Bardiete "  from 
"  barditus,"  a  word  used  by  Tacitus,  had  been  inspired 
by  that  enthusiasm  for  national  antiquity  due  to 
Macpherson's  Ossian.  A  translation  of  Ossian  was  pub- 
lished in  1764,  and  appealed  with  even  greater  force 
to  the  German  imagination  than  the  original  to  the 
English.  Besides  Klopstock,  the  leading  German  "  bards," 
as  the  imitators  of  Ossian  liked  to  call  themselves, 
were  H.  W.  von  Gerstenberg  (1737-1823),  who,  with 
his  Gedicht  eines  Ska/den  (1766),  inaugurated  the  Ger- 
man movement,  K.  F.  Kretschmann  (1738-1809),  the 
author  of  an  empty,  rhetorical  Gesang  Rhingulfs  des 
Barden,  als  Varus  geschlagen  war  (1768),  and,  most 
gifted  of  the  three,  Michael  Denis  (1729-1800),  an 


THE  BARDS;   GESSNER.  ng 

Austrian,  who  was  largely  instrumental  in  introducing 
North  German  ideas  and  poetry  into  Austria ;  his  poems 
appeared  under  the  characteristic  title  Lieder  Sineds  (an 
anagram  of  Denis)  des  Barden  in  1772.  The  "bardic" 
movement  was,  however,  short-lived;  it  was  a  plant 
without  roots,  and  soon  withered  in  the  fierce  light  of 
the  "  Sturm  und  Drang " ;  but  it  awakened  the  nation's 
interest  in  its  own  past,  and  prepared  the  way  for  a  truer 
patriotic  poetry  at  a  later  date ;  its  most  immediate 
successors  were  the  group  of  poets  known  as  the 
"  Gottinger  Dichterbund." 

One  more  writer  of  the  age  of  Klopstock  has  to  be 
mentioned,  a  writer  somewhat  difficult  to  class,  Salomon 
Gessner  (1730-88).  Gessner  was  a  Swiss  who  spent  some 
years  learning  the  trade  of  a  bookseller  in  Berlin,  where 
he  came  into  touch  with  the  literary  world.  But  Berlin 
was  not  congenial  to  his  quiet,  retiring,  nature  -  loving 
temperament,  and  in  literature  as  in  life  he  went  his 
own  way.  In  1756  appeared  his  first  collection  of  prose 
Idyllen,  which  had  been  preceded  by  a  pastoral  romance, 
Daphnis  (1754),  and  were  followed  by  a  prose  epic,  Der 
Tod  Abels  (1758).  These  were  the  most  popular  German 
books,  not  only  in  Germany  but  in  Europe,  before  the 
appearance  of  Goethe's  Werther.  Gessner  was  a  lyric 
poet  hardly  less  gifted  in  his  way  than  Klopstock  ;  but 
the  power  of  expression  in  verse  was  denied  to  him.  His 
poetry  shows  a  strange  mingling  of  two  widely  different 
epochs ;  the  artificial  rococo  of  the  Renaissance  is  in- 
fused with  a  fervid  love  of  nature,  for  which  Gessner 
always  finds  the  aptest  and  most  delicate  poetic  ex- 
pression. He  lived  in  an  ideal,  unreal  world,  in  which 
poetry  and  nature  were  one. 


I2O 


CHAPTER    XII. 

LESSING. 

WHILE  Klopstock  was  modern  Germany's  first  national 
poet  of  genius,  Lessing  was  her  first  writer  whose  sig- 
nificance was  European.  In  a  higher  degree  than  any 
other  author  of  his  time,  Lessing  was  the  incarnation  of  the 
best  spirit  of  the  eighteenth  century ;  as  a  poet,  as  a  critic, 
as  a  philosopher,  and  as  a  theologian,  he  is  a  rationalist 
in  the  best  sense  of  that  word.  He  is  to  Germany  what 
Voltaire  is  to  France,  but  with  the  difference  that  while 
Voltaire's  work,  coming  with  its  scathing  satire  and  witty 
frivolity  after  the  most  brilliant  epoch  in  French  letters, 
may  be  compared  with  the  satyr -play  which  closed  the 
Greek  trilogy,  Lessing's  is  the  serious  prologue  to  the 
classical  epoch  of  German  literature. 

Born  at  Kamenz  in  the  Oberlausitz  in  Saxony,  on 
January  22,  1729,  Gotthold  Ephraim  Lessing  was 
educated  at  the  Fiirstenschule  of  St  Afra  in  Meissen, 
and  matriculated  in  1746  as  a  student  of  theology  in 
Leipzig.  Although  he  was  not  actually  a  member  of  the 
circle  of  writers  who  contributed  to  the  Bremer  Beitrage, 
his  early  plays,  such  as  Der  junge  Gelehrte  (1747),  Der 
Freigeist  (1749),  Die  Ju den  (1749),  and  the  epigrams  and 
anacreontics  of  his  Kleinigkeiten  (1751),  have  little  to 
distinguish  them  from  the  productions  of  the  Leipzig 
group.  Thus  one  might  say  that  Lessing  virtually  began 
his  literary  career  in  the  train  of  Gottsched. 

In  Leipzig  his  chief  ambition,  as  he  once  wrote  to 
his  father,  had  been  to  be  a  "German  Moliere";  in 


LESSING    IN    BERLIN.  121 

Berlin,  where,  except  for  a  few  months  spent  at  Witten- 
berg in  the  beginning  of  1752,  he  lived  from  the  end 
of  1748  to  1755,  he  seems  to  have  set  his  heart  on 
being  Germany's  Voltaire.  In  the  literary  supplement 
which  he  edited  for  the  Berlinische  privilegierte  Zeitung, 
or  Vossische  Zeitung,  he  attracted  attention  by  the  force 
and  decision  of  his  criticism,  and  still  more  by  his  Vade- 
mecum  filr  Herrn  Sam.  Gotth.  Lange,  (1754),  a  trenchant 
attack  on  Lange,  the  Halle  poet  and  translator  of  Horace. 
Quite  in  the  spirit  of  Voltaire  was  Lessing's  series  of 
Rettungen  (1753-54),  "vindications "  of  authors  who,  in 
his  opinion,  had,  for  theological  or  other  reasons,  been 
misjudged.  In  two  short-lived  quarterlies,  Beitrdge  zur 
Historic  und  Aufnahme  des  Theaters  (1750)  and  Theatra- 
lische  Bibliothek  (1754-58),  he  carried  on  the  work  begun 
by  Elias  Schlegel,  preparing  the  way  for  a  serious  German 
drama  and  serious  dramatic  criticism.  It  is,  however, 
rather  the  wide  catholicity  of  Lessing's  views  than  any 
marked  originality  that  characterises  these  journals ;  and 
following  Voltaire  and  Diderot,  he  turned  his  attention 
to  the  English  drama  and  arrived  ultimately  at  the  con- 
clusion that  Germany  had  more  to  learn  from  England 
than  from  France. 

But  Lessing  did  not  only  theorise ;  he  gave  practical 
effect  to  his  views  in  Miss  Sara  Sampson,  a  "  biirgerliches 
Trauerspiel "  produced  in  1755.  As  the  first  of  a  long 
line  of  German  "  domestic  tragedies "  extending  down 
into  our  own  time,  Miss  Sara  Sampson  might  well  be 
called  the  most  influential  innovation  in  the  whole  history 
of  the  German  stage.  The  play  is  of  unmistakable  Eng- 
lish origin,  being  an  imitation  of  George  Lillo's  London 
Merchant,  or  the  History  of  George  Barnwell  (1731), 
while  Richardson's  novel  Clarissa  Harlowe  supplied  Les- 
sing with  some  traits  for  his  characters.  The  scene  of 
the  play  is  England.  Sara  Sampson  has  eloped  with  her 
lover  Mellefont,  and  they  are  living  at  an  inn.  A  former 
mistress  of  Mellefont's,  Marwood,  discovers  them  here 
and  informs  Sara's  father.  She  endeavours  under  a  false 
name  to  enlist  Sara's  sympathy  for  herself,  and  to  sepa- 


122  LESSING. 

rate  her  from  Mellefont.  Meanwhile  Sampson  arrives 
and  is  willing  to  forgive  his  daughter ;  whereupon  Mar- 
wood  poisons  Sara,  and  Mellefont  kills  himself  with 
Marwood's  dagger.  Not  only  the  scene  and  the  char- 
acters of  this  lachrymose  tragedy  are  English ;  the 
technique  is  English  too.  The  most  conspicuously 
German  contribution  is  the  tendency  to  allow  the  in- 
terest in  feelings  and  emotions  to  override  what  to 
the  English  playwright  was  more  important,  that  in  the 
moral  purpose.  Miss  Sara  Sampson  is  not  a  great  play ; 
even  Lessing's  contemporaries  soon  discovered  its  weak- 
nesses, but  with  it  the  German  drama  made  a  great 
stride  forwards. 

Independently  of  Lessing,  however,  German  dramatic 
literature  was  making  steady  progress.  When  Lessing 
returned  to  Leipzig  after  the  production  of  Miss  Sara, 
he  found  the  theatre  in  n  much  more  promising  con- 
dition than  when  he  had  lived  there  seven  years  before. 
Two  writers  in  particular  interested  him,  both  of  whom 
were  unfortunately  cut  off  at  an  early  age,  namely  J.  F. 
von  Cronegk  (1731-58),  author  of  a  prize  tragedy,  Codrus, 
and  an  unfinished  play,  Olint  und  Sophronia,  and  J.  W. 
von  Brawe  (1738-58),  who,  under  Lessing's  influence, 
wrote  a  tragedy  in  blank  verse,  Hmtus,  and  an  excellent 
"  btirgerliche  Tragodie  "  in  prose,  Der  Freigeist.  Another 
friend  of  Lessing's,  C.  F.  Weisse  (1726-1804),  had  more 
success  as  a  playwright ;  he  adapted  to  the  popular 
taste  of  the  day  the  ideals  of  more  ambitious  writers, 
and  wrote  an  easy,  fluent  dialogue  superior  to  that 
of  Gellert  and  his  friends.  He  translated  and  adapted 
Richard  III.  in  alexandrines,  converted  Romeo  and  Juliet 
into  a  "  biirgerliche  Tragodie,"  and  acclimatised  English 
and  French  operettas  on  the  German  stage.  Lessing 
himself  soon  left  the  crude  realism  of  Miss  Sara  Sampson 
behind  him  in  the  fine  one-act  tragedy  Philotas  (i  759) 
and  in  the  fragment  of  a  drama  of  Faust  (1759). 

Meanwhile,  in  conjunction  with  two  Berlin  friends, 
Moses  Mendelssohn  and  C.  F.  Nicolai,  Lessing  had 
established  the  Briefe,  die  neueste  Liter atur  betreffend 


THE    "  LITERATURBRIEFE."  123 

(J 759-65).  in  which,  for  the  first  time,  he  rose  to  his 
full  height  as  a  literary  critic.  Moses  Mendelssohn 
(1729-86)  was  a  thinker  of  originality  and  insight,  and 
the  first  of  the  so-called  "  Popularphilosophen."  In  his 
most  popular  work,  Phddon  (1767),  he  helped  to  spread 
the  ideas  of  the  "  Aufldarung,"  making  them  more  gener- 
ally palatable  by  a  superficial  varnish  of  Greek  philosophy. 
In  collaboration  with  Mendelssohn,  Lessing  wrote  the 
prize-essay/3^  ein  Metaphysiker !  (1755),  C.  F.  Nicolai 
(1733-1811)  was  a  Berlin  bookseller,  whose  obdurate 
adherence  throughout  his  long  life  to  the  narrow  rational- 
ism of  his  youth,  caused  him  to  be  regarded  by  a 
younger  generation  as  the  representative  of  all  that  was 
shallow  in  literature  and  as  the  antagonist  of  progress.  But 
his  religious  novel  Sebaldus  Nothanker  (1773-75),  and  his 
popular  Beschreibung  einer  Reise  durch  Deutschland  und 
die  Schweiz  (1783)  were  regarded  as  advanced  works  in 
their  day. 

In  the  fifty- four  letters  which  Lessing  contributed  to 
the  Literaturbriefe  he  showed  himself  to  be  a  critic 
without  a  rival  among  his  contemporaries.  The  clear 
and  impartial  judgment  which  had  already  been  con- 
spicuous in  his  early  criticism  is  here  still  more  marked ; 
the  leading  phenomena  of  German  literature  are  passed 
in  review,  and  poets  like  Wieland  and  Klopstock  judged 
with  a  finality  which  posterity  has  hardly  needed  to  revise. 
Here,  too,  Lessing  has  at  last  come  to  clearness  with 
himself  about  Shakespeare,  and,  abandoning  Voltaire's 
views  of  the  English  poet,  he  boldly  pronounces  him 
to  be  a  more  faithful  observer  of  the  Aristotelian  laws 
of  the  drama  than  the  French  tragic  poets  of  the  seven- 
teenth century.  Before  such  incisive  and  convincing- 
criticism  one  is  tempted  to  say  that  the  critical  method 
of  the  eighteenth  century — that  is  to  say,  the  method  of 
sitting  in  judgment  on  poetry  and  art  from  an  assumedly 
superior  standpoint,  which  held  its  own  in  Europe  until 
long  after  the  Romantic  School  had  set  up  new  ideals — 
touches  in  Lessing  its  highest  point. 
The  Literary  Letters  were  occupied  for  the  most  part  with 


124  LESSING. 

books,  with  the  facts  of  literary  history  ;  in  his  next  two 
critical  works,  Lessing  discussed  the  principles  of  aesthetics 
and  the  theory  of  criticism.  These  were  the  Laokoon  and 
the  Hamburgische  Dramaturgic.  In  the  former  of  these, 
Lessing  is  associated  with  one  of  the  master-minds  of  the 
age,  Johann  Joachim  Winkelmann  (1717-68).  Compared 
with  Lessing,  Winkelmann  was  a  more  naive  type  of  genius  ; 
he  seemed  an  ancient  Greek  born  by  accident  into  a  world 
of  artificial  pseudo-classicism  :  to  him  the  true  under- 
standing for  the  antique,  which  Lessing  only  arrived  at 
slowly  by  a  process  of  self -education,  came,  we  might 
say,  natural.  His  monumental  Geschichte  der  Kunst  des 
Altertums  (1764)  is  one  of  the  great  books  of  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  and  laid  the  foundations  on  which  the 
whole  modern  study  of  the  history  of  art  is  built  up.  In 
an  earlier  booklet,  Gedanken  iiber  die  Nachahmung  der 
griechischen  Werke  in  der  Mahlerei  und  Bildhauerkunst 
(1755),  Winkelmann  had  expressed  the  opinion  that  the 
characteristic  of  Greek  masterpieces  was  "a  noble  sim- 
plicity and  a  calm  grandeur,  both  in  posture  and  ex- 
pression." This  thought  brought  order  into  a  train  of 
ideas  which  had  long  occupied  Lessing's  mind,  and  which 
now  found  expression  in  Laokoon,  oder  iiber  die  Grenzen 
der  Malerei  und  Poesie  (1766).  Lessing's  sharp  analytical 
mind  discovered  the  logical  weakness  in  Winkelmann's 
interpretation  as  applied  to  the  Laokoon  group  ;  he  pointed 
out  that  the  superiority  of  the  sculptor's  Laokoon  to 
Virgil's  description  of  Laokoon's  death  was  not  necessarily 
a  superiority  at  all.  It  was  rather  a  question  of  two 
entirely  different  arts,  the  methods  of  which  were  different. 
The  medium  of  the  sculptor  or  painter,  he  showed,  was 
space,  that  of  the  poet,  time  ;  the  painter  depicts  objects 
in  juxtaposition,  the  poet  in  sequence.  From  this  obser- 
vation he  proceeded  to  define  the  boundaries  of  the 
various  arts,  especially  that  of  poetry,  which  in  the  de- 
scriptions of  nature  so  popular  at  that  time  had  been 
unduly  encroaching  on  the  province  of  the  painter.  The 
influence  of  this  book  was,  as  of  all  Lessing's  works, 
immediate  and  decisive ;  it  counteracted  the  growing 


LAOKOON  AND  HAMBURGISCHE  DRAMATURGIE.   125 

fondness  for  descriptive  writing,  and  removed  obstacles 
which  were  impeding  the  advance  of  German  poetry. 

The  Laokoon  is  a  fragment.  Lessing  had  the  intention 
of  publishing  a  second  volume  in  which  the  aesthetic  basis 
of  the  drama  would  probably  have  been  discussed.  Many 
new  problems  in  dramatic  art,  similar  to  those  which  he 
had  attacked  in  his  Laokoon,  were  forcing  themselves  on 
his  attention  :  the  definition  of  tragedy  and  the  validity 
of  Aristotle ;  the  delimitation  of  comedy,  tragi-comedy, 
"  domestic "  drama ;  the  province  of  the  actor's  art. 
Moreover,  just  at  this  time  C.  W.  von  Gluck  (1714- 
87)  was  evolving  in  his  operas  a  new  type  of  drama 
analogous  to  that  of  the  Greeks  ;  his  Orfeo  ed  Euridice 
(1762)  and  Alceste  (1767)  could  not  but  have  interested 
the  author  of  the  Laokoon ;  and  Gluck's  later  operas, 
Iphigenie  en  Aulide  (1774)  and  Iphigenie  en  Tauride 
(1779),  probably  still  more.  These  interesting  questions 
of  dramatic  theory,  which  might  have  found  a  .place  in 
the  second  part  of  the  Laokoon,  were  reserved  for  the 
Hamburgische  Dramaturgic  (1767-68). 

This  work  was  a  periodical  commentary  on  the  work  of 
the  Hamburg  National  Theatre,  which  had  been  founded 
by  several  Hamburg  citizens  in  1767,  and  to  which 
Lessing  was  appointed  critic  and  literary  adviser.  The 
unsatisfactory  repertory  of  the  theatre,  the  financial  diffi- 
culties which  weighed  heavily  on  it  from  the  beginning,  and 
the  unwillingness  of  the  actors  to  subordinate  themselves 
to  higher  artistic  ideals  soon  compelled  Lessing  to  with- 
draw from  any  immediate  connection  with  the  under- 
taking, and  to  regard  the  performances  merely  as  an 
occasion  for  expressing  his  own  views  on  literary  and 
dramaturgic  matters.  The  Hamburgische  Dramaturgic 
contains  the  ripest  opinions  which  eighteenth  -  century 
classicism  attained  to  on  the  subject  of  the  drama  ;  in 
persistent  antagonism  to  Voltaire,  Lessing  completed 
what  Voltaire  had  begun,  just  as,  in  earlier  years,  in  con- 
flict with  Gottsched  he  advanced  the  classic  movement 
which  Gottsched  had  inaugurated.  He  denied,  with 
perhaps  greater  zeal  than  judgment,  the  merits  of  French 


126  LESSING. 

classic  tragedy,  and  pinned  his  faith  to  Sophocles 
and  Shakespeare,  the  greatness  of  these  poets  being 
measured  by  the  theories  of  Aristotle.  In  Lessing's  eyes 
the  drama  of  all  time  stood  or  fell  according  to  the  Greek 
critic's  laws,  and  a  large  part  of  the  Dramaturgic  is 
devoted  to  an  elucidation  of  Aristotle.  It  is,  however, 
significant  of  Lessing's  wideness  of  view  that  he  has  also 
something  to  say  of  the  drama  of  Spain. 

As  twelve  years  before,  Lessing's  theory  was  accom- 
panied and  followed  by  practice.  The  critical  standpoint 
of  the  Hamburgische  Dramaturgic  is  illustrated  and  exem- 
plified by  his  own  three  ripest  dramas,  Minna  von  Barn- 
helm,  oder  das  Soldatengliick  (1767),  Emilia  Galotti (i 77 2), 
and  Nathan  der  Weise  (1779). 

Minna  von  Barnhelm  is  Germany's  first  national 
comedy ;  it  embodies  as  no  comedy  had  attempted  to 
do  before  in  German  literature,  the  events,  the  ideas, 
and  the  atmosphere  of  its  time ;  it  was,  as  Goethe 
well  said,  the  truest  product  of  the  Seven  Years'  War. 
Neither,  however,  the  motives  nor  the  situations  of  the 
drama  are  specifically  German  ;  it  abounds  in  analogies  to 
the  European  comedy  of  the  earlier  eighteenth  century, 
from  Farquhar's  Beaux'  Stratagem  to  Voltaire's  L'Ecos- 
saise.  Major  von  Tellheim  has  been  discharged  from  the 
army  under  circumstances  which  reflect  on  his  good  name, 
and  his  sense  of  honour  forbids  him  to  hold  Minna  von 
Barnhelm,  a  Saxon  heiress,  to  her  engagement  with  him. 
Accompanied  by  her  maid,  Franziska,  and  her  uncle — 
who,  however,  does  not  appear  until  the  close — she  comes 
to  Berlin  and  alights  at  the  same  inn  where  Tellheim  has 
taken  up  his  quarters  ;  indeed,  she  is  the  unwitting  cause 
of  Tellheim  being  turned  out  of  his  room  by  the  avaricious 
landlord.  Tellheim  moves  to  another  inn,  leaving  the 
landlord  a  ring  as  payment  of  his  debt.  The  landlord 
shows  the  ring  to  Minna,  who  recognises  it  and  advances 
the  required  sum  on  it.  In  an  interview  with  the  major, 
Minna  endeavours  to  show  him  that  his  ideas  of  honour 
are  exaggerated,  but  without  success  ;  so  she  has  recourse 
to  strategy.  She  leads  Tellheim  to  believe  that,  owing  to 


"MINNA  VON  BARNHELM."  127 

her  engagement  with  a  Prussian  officer,  she  has  been  dis- 
inherited by  her  uncle.  This  brings  him  at  once  to  her 
feet,  but  it  is  now  her  turn  to  stand  upon  her  dignity ; 
she  refuses  to  be  a  burden  to  him  and  returns  him  his 
ring,  this  being,  as  he  discovers  afterwards,  the  ring  she 
had  redeemed  from  the  landlord.  A  letter  arrives  from 
the  king  exonerating  Tellheim  from  all  blame  and  rein- 
stating him  in  his  position. 

While  Minna  von  Barnhelm  has  retained  its  vitality  as 
a  stage  play  longer  than  any  other  of  Lessing's  dramas, 
Emilia  Galotti  stands  more  immediately  in  the  line  of 
national  development.  For  it  has,  on  the  one  hand, 
much  in  common  with  the  "biirgerliche  Tragodie  "  which 
Lessing  himself  introduced  from  England,  and  on  the 
other,  it  is  the  connecting  link  between  that  form  of  drama 
and  the  drama  of  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang."  Its  strength 
lies  in  its  clearly  cut  figures,  especially  the  crafty  chamber- 
lain, Marinelli,  and  the  Grafin  Orsini ;  its  weakness  in  the 
attempt  to  adapt  to  the  mental  horizon  of  the  eighteenth 
century  an  essentially  antique  theme.  Emilia  Galotti  is 
virtually  the  Roman  story  of  Virginia.  The  scene  is  laid 
at  an  Italian  court.  The  Prince  of  Guastalla  loves  Emilia 
who  is  on  the  point  of  being  married  to  a  Graf  Appiani. 
The  prince's  chamberlain,  Marinelli,  arranges  a  plot 
to  frustrate  this  union.  The  carriage  containing  the 
young  count,  Emilia,  and  her  mother,  is  waylaid  near  a 
country  residence  of  the  prince's ;  the  count  is  shot  and 
Emilia  rescued  from  her  alleged  robbers  and  carried  to 
the  prince's  residence.  Her  father,  Odoardo,  learns  of 
the  prince's  nefarious  design s,  and,  rather  than  let  his 
daughter  fall  into  his  hands,  he  stabs  her  like  a  second 
Virginius. 

The  stormy  conflicts  which  had  raged  round  Lessing's 
head  for  the  best  part  of  his  life,  increased  in  intensity 
towards  its  close ;  he  never  ceased  to  fight  for  that 
spiritual  freedom,  which  had  always  seemed  to  him  the 
end  and  aim  of  the  "  education  of  humanity."  A  con- 
troversy on  antiquarian  subjects  with  C.  A.  Klotz,  an 
authority  on  such  subjects  in  Halle,  resulted  in  the  Brief e 


128  LESSING. 

antiquarischen  Inhalts  (1768-69)  and  the  beautiful  little 
study  on  Wie  die  Alien  den  Tod gebildet  (1769).  In  1773 
he  began  to  publish  under  the  title  Zur  Geschichte  und 
Literatnr,  forgotten  or  undiscovered  treasures  from  the 
Ducal  library  of  Wolfenbiittel,  of  which  he  had,  in  1770, 
been  appointed  keeper.  He  took  the  opportunity  of  includ- 
ing in  this  series  some  fragments  by  a  writer  whose  name 
was  not  disclosed  until  forty  years  later — H.  S.  Reimarus 
(1694-1768)  —  in  which  the  facts  of  Christian  origins 
were  subjected  to  a  rationalistic  investigation.  This  was 
the  signal  for  another  and  the  last  and  bitterest  attack  of 
all ;  the  German  theological  world,  with  the  chief  pastor 
of  Hamburg,  J.  M.  Goeze,  at  its  head,  rose  up  against 
Lessing.  To  find  another  theological  controversy  carried 
on  with  such  acrimony,  one  would  have  to  go  back 
to  Reformation  times ;  and  even  the  Reformation  has 
hardly  anything  more  vigorous  and  trenchant  to  point  to 
than  Lessing's  Eine  Duplik,  Eine  Parabe!,  Axiomata,  and 
eleven  Anti-Goeze  (1778).  Meanwhile  Lessing's  life  had 
been  clouded  by  personal  suffering ;  his  marriage  with 
Eva  Konig  in  1776  awakens  in  us  a  personal  interest  in 
an  author  who,  more  than  any  other  of  his  century,  lives 
as  a  purely  intellectual  force  ;  and  that  interest  is  deepened 
into  sympathy  by  the  tragic  bereavement  which  left 
Lessing  a  widower  in  little  over  a  year. 

Lessing  emerged,  purified  and  chastened  by  his  trials 
and  conflicts,  and  a  mild  beauty  lies  over  the  crowning 
achievements  of  his  career,  the  noble  Ernst  und  Falk  : 
Gesprdche  fiir  Freimcuirer  (1778),  Die  Erziehung  des 
Menschengeschlechts  (1780),  that  concentration  of  Lessing's 
evolutional  idealism,  and  the  drama  of  Nathan  der  Weise 
(1779).  In  form,  a  development  under  the  influence  of 
Diderot  of  the  philosophic  drama  of  Voltaire,  Nathan 
der  Weise  stands  aside  from  the  main  movement  of 
German  dramatic  literature,  which,  in  1779,  was,  one 
might  say,  seething  in  the  cauldron  of  Shakespearean 
"  Sturm  und  Drang."  But  Nathan  has  to  be  judged,  less 
as  a  drama  for  the  theatre,  than  as  an  embodiment  of 
Lessing's  own  lofty  dreams  of  humanity  and  wise  tolerance. 


NATHAN    DER    WEISE." 


I2Q 


There  is  little  plot  in  it,  and  not  much  dramatic  movement. 
What  there  is,  is  built  up  round  a  fable  which  Lessing 
found  in  Boccaccio's  Decameron.  Nathan  the  wise  Jew 
is  summoned  before  the  Mohammedan  Saladin  and  asked 
to  pronounce  judgment  as  to  which  of  the  three  religions, 
Christianity,  Judaism,  or  Mohammedanism,  is  the  true 
one ;  and  he  tells  a  story  of  three  rings.  A  certain  man 
possesses  a  ring  of  magic  power,  which  renders  all  who 
believe  in  its  virtue  pleasing  to  God  and  to  men.  He 
has  three  sons,  whom  he  loves  equally  well,  and  in  order 
not  to  enrich  one  at  the  expense  of  the  other,  he  has  two 
rings  made  exactly  like  the  genuine  one.  At  the  father's 
death  the  sons  dispute  as  to  who  possesses  the  true  ring 
— just  as  Christian,  Jew,  and  Mohammedan  dispute  re- 
garding the  true  religion — and  the  wise  judge  advises  each 
of  them  to  believe  his  ring  to  be  the  true  one  and  live 
and  act  accordingly.  Lessing  invented  as  a  framework  to 
this  anecdote  a  story  which  makes  excessive  demands 
on  our  credulity.  The  Jew's  adopted  daughter  Recha 
turns  out  to  be  of  Christian  birth,  and  sister  of  the 
Knight  Templar  who  has  rescued  her  from  fire  and 
loves  her,  while  Saladin  is  discovered  ultimately  to  be 
their  uncle.  Thus  the  mutual  tolerance  and  respect 
which  Lessing  wished  to  see  in  the  different  religions, 
is  emphasised  by  family  ties  between  the  representatives 
of  these  religions.  The  plot  of  Nathan  der  Weise  is 
artificial  to  the  point  of  absurdity,  its  characters  are  too 
theoretically  conceived,  and  its  verse  is  often  prosaic  and 
wanting  in,  dignity ;  but  it  is  none  the  less  the  greatest 
literary  product  of  the  German  "  Aufklk'rung,"  and  the 
first  important  play  written  in  blank  verse.  It  pointed 
out  to  Schiller  the  way  by  which  the  German  drama  was 
to  be  raised  from  "Sturm  und  Drang"  realism  to  higher 
things. 

Lessing  himself  did  not  long  survive  the  death  of  his 
wife;  he  died  in  1781,  the  year  which  saw  the  publication 
of  the  cfowntng  achievement  of  the  movement  of  enlighten- 
ment with  which  Lessing  himself  was  most  closely  associ- 
ated, Kant's  Kritik  der  reinen  Vernunft, 


130 


CHAPTER   XIII. 

WIELAND    AND    HERDER  ;     THE    GOTTINGER    DICHTERBUND. 

LIKE  Lessing,  Wieland  was  also  one  of  Germany's  intel- 
lectual liberators,  but  a  liberator  of  a  different  kind. 
While  Lessing  freed  Germany  from  a  false  classicism  and 
a  stultifying  dogmatism,  Wieland  freed  her  from  the  oppo- 
site extreme — from  the  unbridled  revelling  in  sentiment 
and  emotion,  which  came  in  the  train  of  Klopstock  and 
Rousseau  ;  Lessing's  antidote  was  the  art,  the  criticism, 
and  the  poetry  of  ancient  Greece,  Wieland's  the  lighter 
literature  of  the  Romance  peoples. 

Christoph  Martin  Wieland  was  born  near  Biberach  in 
Wiirtemberg  on  September  5,  1733.  His  early  educa- 
tion and  the  influences  under  which  he  grew  up  were 
pervaded  by  pietism,  and  his  own  early  writings  were 
modelled  on  those  of  Klopstock  and  Bodmer ;  like  Klop- 
stock, he  spent  several  months  in  Zurich  as  the  guest  of 
Bodmer.  Here  he  adapted  himself  more  successfully  to 
what  Bodmer  expected  of  him,  and  he  obtained  a  tutorship 
which  kept  him  in  Zurich  for  five  years.  In  1760  he 
settled  in  Biberach  as  director  of  the  chancellery ;  and  a 
Graf  von  Stadion,  whose  seat  was  in  the  neighbourhood, 
introduced  him  to  a  new  literary  world  which  was  much 
more  to  his  taste  than  the  pietistic  atmosphere  of  Zurich  ; 
he  borrowed  from  the  Graf's  library  the  works  of  the  Eng- 
lish deists,  the  French  encyclopaedists,  and  Voltaire,  and 
studied  the  poetry  of  Ariosto  and  Prior.  Greek  antiquity 
took  the  place  of  the  misty,  elegiac  world  of  Klopstock. 
Voltaire  won  his  interest,  however,  for  Shakespeare, 


WIELAND'S  EARLY  WRITINGS.  131 

the  majority  of  whose  Theatralische  Werke  he  trans- 
lated between  1762  and  1766.  Meanwhile  he  had 
already  experimented  himself  as  a  dramatist  with  plays 
drawn  from  English  sources,  Lady  Johanna  Gray  (1758) 
and  Clementina  von  Poretta  (1760);  and  in  1764  ap- 
peared his  first  important  work  of  fiction,  Der  Sieg  der 
Natur  uber  die  Schwarmerei,  oder  die  Abenteuer  des  Don 
Sylvio  von  Rosalva, — a  novel  in  which  the  hero,  after  the 
manner  of  a  Don  Quixote,  goes  out  into  the  world  to  dis- 
cover the  fairies  in  whose  existence  he  firmly  believes. 
Wieland  here  reveals  himself  as  the  cynical  rationalist 
who  laughs  at  his  own  earlier  enthusiasms  and  supersti- 
tions. The  same  spirit,  still  more  frivolously  cynical,  is 
to  be  seen  in  his  Komische  Erzahlungen  in  verse  (1765). 
A  more  ambitious  and  serious  novel  followed  in  1766- 
67,  Die  Geschichte  des  Agathon.  In  this  work  Wieland 
unrolls,  against  that  antique  background  to  which  he  re- 
mained more  or  less  faithful  throughout  his  career,  the 
history  of  his  own  spiritual  development.  The  plot  is 
indifferently  constructed,  but  in  laying  the  chief  emphasis 
on  the  psychological  development  of  his  hero,  Wieland 
adapted  to  German  fiction  the  methods  of  Richardson, 
and  created  the  first  important  German  novel  on  modern 
lines,  a  forerunner  of  Wilhelm  Meister.  In  1769  Wieland 
was  professor  of  philosophy  at  the  University  of  Erfurt, 
where  he  remained  until  1772,  when  he  was  called  to 
Weimar  by  the  Duchess,  to  be  tutor  to  her  two  sons, 
Karl  August  and  Konstantin.  Weimar  remained  Wieland's 
home  until  his  death  in  1813.  As  editor  of  the  Teutsche 
Merkur  (1773-89),  he  occupied  a  commanding  position 
in  German  letters,  and  most  of  his  own  works  were  pub- 
lished for  the  first  time  in  this  periodical.  Tales  in  light, 
easily  flowing  verse  followed  each  other  in  rapid  succession 
(Musarion,  1768;  Gandalin,  1776;  Geron  der  Adlige, 
1777);  the  didactic  novel,  Der  goldene  Spiegel,  oder  die 
Konige  von  Scheschian  (1772),  half  fiction,  half  political 
treatise,  which  had  commended  him  to  the  Duchess  of 
Weimar,  was  followed  by  the  entertaining  satire,  Die  Abde- 
riten  (1774),  in  which  German  provincialism  is  held  up  to 


132  WIELAND    AND    HERDER. 

ridicule;  and  to  these  succeeded  didactic  Greek  novels 
(Aristipp  und  einige  seiner  Zeitgenossen,  1800-2)  and 
translations  of  the  classics. 

The  most  famous  of  all  Wieland's  works,  and  the  only 
one  which  is  still  read  to-day,  is  his  epic  Oberon,  which 
appeared  in  1780,  when  the  "Sturm  und  Drang  "'was 
well  advanced.  But  there  is  hardly  an  echo  of  "  Sturm 
und  Drang  "  in  this  sunny  revival  of  the  French  mediaeval 
romance  of  Hiion  of  Bordeaux,  in  which  Wieland,  like  an 
eighteenth  century  Ariosto,  took  so  childlike  a  delight. 
Oberon  stands  as  far  from  the  German  world  of  to-day 
as  The  Faery  Queene  from  modern  England ;  for  although 
Wieland  eked  out  the  old  story  with  borrowings  from 
Shakespeare  and  Chaucer,  he  made  no  attempt  to  mod- 
ernise it ;  the  interest  we  still  take  in  the  poem  is  due 
solely  to  its  graceful  verse  and  easy  narrative.  Wieland 
was  a  liberator  from  an  excessive  Germanic  fervour,  but 
he  can  hardly  be  regarded  as  one  of  the  builders  of 
modern  German  literature  ;  his  influence  was  a  negative 
one,  destructive  rather  than  constructive.  Thus,  with  the 
exception  of  a  few  Austrian  writers,  like  J.  A.  Blumauer 
(1755-98),  the  author  of  a  parody  on  the  Aeneid  (1783), 
and  J.  B.  von  Alxinger  (1755-97),  who  wrote  epics  in 
Wieland's  style,  Wieland  had  few  disciples.  Even  in  the 
comic  epic  and  the  novel,  we  can  only  regard  Wieland  as 
one  of  many  crossing  influences  which  moulded  the  work  of 
the  other  writers  of  this  age.  There  is,  for  instance,  little 
or  nothing  of  Wieland's  spirit  in  Die  Jobsiade  (1784),  an 
admirable  comic  epic  in  "  Knittelverse,"  by  K.  A.  Kortum 
(1742-1824),  and  the  tendency  is  to  overestimate  his  in- 
fluence on  M.  A.  von  Thiimmel  (1738-1817),  a  writer  who 
is  still  remembered  by  his  comic  epic  in  prose,  Wilhel- 
mine  (1764),  and  his  Reise  in  die  mittaglichen  Provinzen 
von  Frankreich  (1791-1805),  the  best  of  the  many  German 
imitations  of  Sterne's  Sentimental  Journey. 

The  German  novel  of  the  eighteenth  century  preferred 
rather  to  go  direct  to  the  great  innovators,  Richardson 
and  Fielding,  Sterne  and  Rousseau,  than  to  build  on  the 
basis  Wieland  had  laid.  Indeed,  we  have  again  to  turn 


FICTION    AND    DIDACTIC    LITERATURE.  133 

to  Austria  to  find  in  A.  G.  Meissner  (1753-1807),  the 
author  of  Alcibiades  (1781-88)  and  a  many-volumed  col- 
lection of  Skizzen  (1778-96),  an  unmistakable  imitator 
of  Wieland.  Amongst  the  many  authors  of  novels  on 
English  and  French  lines  at  this  time,  mention  may  be 
made  of  J.  T.  Hermes  (1738-1821),  Sophie  von  Laroche 
(1730-1807),  A.  von  Knigge  (1752-96),  T.  G.  von  Hippel 
(1741-96),  and  C.  F.  Nicolai,  who  has  been  already  dis- 
cussed in  connection  with  Lessing.  J.  K.  A.  Musaus 
(1735-87),  who,  in  spite  of  his  rationalistic  standpoint, 
awakened  an  interest  in  German  folklore  with  his  Volks- 
mdrchen  der  Deutschen  (1782-86),  satirised  the  Richard- 
sonian  novel  in  his  Grandison  der  Ziveite  (1760-62). 

Didactic  as  the  novel   of  this  period  was,  it  did   not 
satisfy  the  thirst  for  moral  instruction,  and  we  find,  side 
by  side  with  the  fiction  of  the  time,  an  equally  popular 
pseudo-philosophic  literature,  which  carried  on  the  educa- 
tional work  begun   by  the   moral  weeklies.      To  this  cate- 
gory belong  books  like  the  long  popular  Uber  den  Umgang 
mit  Menschen  (1788)   by  A.  von   Knigge,  the  writings  of 
Moses   Mendelssohn   (1729-86),    Christian  Garve  (1742- 
98)>    J-    J-    Engel    (1741-1802),    and   of   Thomas    Abbt 
(1738-66)  and  Justus  Moser  (1720-94),  to  whom  we  shall 
have  occasion  to* return.    A  typical  "popular  philosopher" 
was  J.  G.  Zimmermann  (1728-95),  a  Swiss,  who  spent  the 
best  part  of  his  life  in  Hanover  as  physician  to  the  English 
king.      In    this    disciple    of   Haller's    the    same    elegiac, 
almost  misanthropic  vein  is  to  be  found  as  in  his  master, 
a   misanthropy   which  the   influence   of  Rousseau   inten- 
sified.     Books  like  his  Betrachtungen  iiber  die  Einsamkeit 
(1756)  and  Von  dem  Nationalstolze  (1758)  are  not  merely 
full  of  suggestive  and  original  thought,  but  often  appear  to 
us,  in  their  avoidance  of  the  conventional  ideas  of  ration- 
alism, strangely  modern  and  prophetic.      To  this  age  be- 
longed, too,  Germany's  greatest  satirist,  G.  C.  Lichtenberg 
(1742-99),    a  native    of    Oberramstadt,   near    Darmstadt. 
Unless  it  be  Lessing,  Germany  possessed  no  clearer-headed 
man  of  letters  in  the  eighteenth  century  than  Lichtenberg  ; 
he  had  an  unrivalled  power  of  precise  and  lucid  expres- 


134  WIELAND    AND    HERDER. 

sion.  He  twice  paid  a  visit  to  England  and  had  imbibed 
English  ideas  ;  but  in  his  love  for  the  aphorism,  he  was 
rather  the  German  Larochefoucauld  than  the  German 
Swift.  Unfortunately,  however,  his  writings  are  fragment- 
ary and  ephemeral,  and  he  is  best  remembered  now  by 
his  masterly  description  of  Garrick's  acting  in  his  Briefe 
aus  England  (1776-78)  and  his  commentary  on  Hogarth's 
works  (1794-99). 

Johann  Friedrich  Herder  is  the  most  modern  spirit  of 
the  eighteenth  century ;  no  other  thinker  or  writer  of  that 
age,  not  Rousseau  or  Diderot,  not  Kant,  or  even  Goethe 
himself,  had  so  clear  an  idea  whither  human  thought  was 
tending,  or  saw  so  far  into  the  intellectual  movements  of 
the  future  as  he.  But  it  is  as  an  originator  of  new  ideasz 
not  as  a  poet,  that  he  takes  rank  among  the  leaders  of 
modern  German  literature.  His  historical  position  is  due. 
to  the  fact  that  he  brought  the  movement  inaugurated  by 
Klopstock  into  harmony  with  the  European  craving  for  a 
"  return  to  nature,"  and  prepared  the  outburst  of  German 
individualism  which  we  know  as  the  "  Geniezeit,"  or 
"Sturm  und  Drang." 

Herder  was  born  in  the  village  of  Mohrungen  in  East 
Prussia  on  August  25,  1744,  and  grew  up  amidst  the 
severest  privations.  At  the  University  of  Konigsberg  he 
came  under  the  influence  of  Kant,  and  won  the  friendship 
of  one  of  the  most  .stimulating  men  of  the  time,  J.  G. 
Hamann  (1730-88),  the  "Magus  im  Norden."  Hamann 
was  a  fervid,  undisciplined  genius,  who  wrote  and  thought 
by  flashes  of  intuition,  and  is  best  remembered  by  his  frag- 
mentary books,  Sokratische  Denkwiirdigkeiten  (1759)  and 
Kreuzziige  des  Philologen  (1762);  he  turned  away  from 
the  insipid  philosophy  of  the  "  Aufklarung,"  and  looked 
to  genius  and  enthusiasm  as  the  motor  forces  of  human- 
ity. Through  Hamann  Herder  became  acquainted 
with  English  literature,  above  all,  with  the  works  of 
Shakespeare  and  with  Ossian.  In  i_7j^2_ Herder,  who 
had  meanwhile  become  teacher  and  preacher  in  the 
Domschule  in  Riga,  published  the  work  by  which  he 
first  became  famous,  Fragments  iiber  die  neuere  deutsche 


HERDER'S  YOUTH.  135 

Literatur,  these  fragments  being  intended  to  serve  as 
supplements  to  the  Literaturbriefe  founded  by  Lessing, 
Nicolai,  and  Mendelssohn.  As  far  as  the  views  expressed 
were  concerned,  Herder's  standpoint  was  not  essentially 
different  from  that  of  the  Literaturbriefe,  but  he  approached 
literature  in  a  different  way.  Lessing's  periodical  was,  as 
we  have  seen,  an  admirable  example  of  that  eighteenth- 
century  criticism,  which  assumes  that  the  critic,  by  virtue 
of  his  office,  stands  at  a  superior  level  to  the  work 
criticised :  Herder's  Fragmente  inaugurated  the  modern 
method_of  criticism,  which  was  first  to  find  general  favour 
with  the  Romantic  School.  The  critic's  duty,  as  here  con- 
ceived, is  to  understand  and  appreciate  rather  than  to 
judge ;  he  approaches  the  masters  of  poetry  in  a  spirit  of 
humble  enthusiasm,  endeavouring  to  find  in  them  general 
ideas  of  universal  application  to  their  age.  The  Frag- 
mente were  followed  in  1769  by  the  more  polemical 
Kritische  Wdlder — the  title  is  an  allusion  to  Quintilian's 
"  sylvae " — in  which  Herder's  position  towards  his  pre- 
decessor Lessing  is  more  sharply  defined. 

In  1769,  after  five  years'  drudgery  in  Riga,  Herder's 
longing  for  freedom  was  realised  ;  he  took  ship  from  Riga 
to  Nantes,  and  spent  nearly  five  months  in  France.  Of 
this  journey  we  possess  a  journal  ( Journal  meiner  Reise  im 
Jahre  1769)  which  forms  one  of  the  most  interesting  of  all 
"Herder's  works  ;  it  is  a  record  of  the  most  magnificent 
literary,  aesthetic,  and  political  dreams  that  ever  haunted  a 
poet's  brain  ;  here  we  find  for  the  first  time  clearly  stated 
that  fundamental  idea  which  runs  through  all  Herder's 
life,  the  idea  of  the  human  race  and  human  culture  as  a 
product  of  historical  evolution.  This  idea  might,  indeed, 
tje  accepted  as  a  summing  up  of  all  Herder's  work  ;  his 
writings  are  a  collection  of  fragments  of  one  great  work 
which  only  existed  in  the  author's  spacious  mind,  a  work 
on  the  evolution  of  mankind. 

After  his  return  from  France  Herder  became  travelling- 
tutor  to  the  son  of  the  Prince-Bishop  of  Liibeck.  and 
arrived  with  his  pupil  in  Strassburg  in  September  1770. 
Here  Herder  broke  off  his  engagement  and  spent  several 


136  WIELAND    AND    HERDER. 

months  undergoing  treatment  for  an  affection  of  the 
lachrymal  gland  ;  in  these  months  Goethe,  then  a  student, 
sat  in  devout  worship  at  his  feet.  In  Strassburg  the 
"Sturm  und  Drang"  movement  was  born,  and  in  1773 
appeared  under  Herder's  aegis  a  little  book  which  may 
be  regarded  as  its  manifesto,  Von  deutscher  Art  und  Kunst. 
"Its  principal  contents  were  an  essay  glorifying  Ossian  and 
popular  song,  and  demanding  a  collection  of  "  Volks- 
lieder  " ;  a  panegyric  on  Shakespeare ;  another  on  Gothic 
architecture  and  the  Strassburg  Minster ;  and  a  retrospect 
on  the  Germanic  past  as  a  lost  ideal.  The  contributors 
were  Herder,  Goethe,  and  Justus  Moser,  the  last  men- 
tioned being  also  the  author  of  the  first  German  history 
written  from  Herder's  evolutional  standpoint,  Osnabriickische 
Geschichte  (1768).  Better  known  are  Moser's  Patriotische 
Phantasien  (1774),  which  show  how  sharp  the  antagonism 
had  become  between  the  old  and  the  new,  between 
eighteenth-century  rationalism  and  "Sturm  und  Drang." 
Herder's  further  contributions  to  the  literature  of  the 
"Sturm  und  Drang"  were  a  prize-essay,  t'ber  den 
Ursprung  der  Sprache  (1772),  two  remarkably  prophetic 
books.  Auch  eine  Philosophic  der  Geschichte  zur  Bildung 
der  Menschheit  (1774),  and  Alteste  Urkunde  des  Men- 
schengeschlechts  (1774),  and,  most  important  of  all,  his 
Volkslicder  (1778-79),  a  collection  of  the  popular  song's 
and  ballads  of  all  peoples.  Meanwhile,  in  1771,  Herder 
had  settled  down  as  chief  pastor  in  Biickeburg,  but  in 
1776,  thanks  to  his  Strassburg  pupil  Goethe,  he  received 
an  invitation  to  become  chief  pastor  and  "  general  super- 
intendent "  in  Weimar  ;  and  Weimar  remained  his  home 
until  his  death  on  December  18,  1803.  His  influence 
on  German  literature  was  practically  limited  to.  the 
awakening  of  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang "  and  his  all-im- 
portant activity  in  the  early  seventies.  But  in  Weimar 
he  wrote  his  most  ambitious  book,  the  Ideen  zur  Philoso- 
phic der  Geschichte  der  Menschheit  (1784-91),  a  work 
which  traced,  in  accordance  with  his  theory  of  historical 
evolution,  the  development  of  human  culture  from  its 
earliest  awakening  down  to  the  Crusades.  Epoch- 


THE  GOTTINGER  DICHTERBUND.       137 

making  as,  in  many  respects,  Herder's  Ideen  was — and 
it  forms  the  link  between  the  old  pedagogic  ideas  of 
Rousseau  and  the  philosophic  system  of  Hegel,  —  its 
Importance  for  the  history  of  literature  is  hardly  greater 
than  that  of  the  many  volumes  of  theological  writings 
which  filled  up  Herder's  time  in  these  years,  or  his  later 
antagonism  to  his  first  teacher  in  philosophy,  Kant. 
Only  once  again,  and  that  in  the  last  years  of  his  life, 
did  Herder  make  a  contribution  of  abiding  value  to  Ger- 
many's poetry  :  in  1805,  more  than  a  year  after  his  death, 
appeared  his  translation  of  the  Spanish  ballad -literature 
centring  in  the  Cid  Campeador.  To  this  book  the 
ballad-poetry  of  the  nineteenth  century  owes  a  debt  that 
has  hardly  been  adequately  acknowledged. 

But  German  literature  as  a  whole  was  not  prepared  to 
make  the  leap  from  Klopstock  to  the  "  Sturm  und 
Drang"  with  such  suddenness  as  its  leaders;  and,  before 
proceeding  to  consider  the  movement  which  Herder  and 
Goethe  initiated,  we  have  to  turn  to  a  group  of  poets  who 
represent  a  more  gradual  transition  from  the  first  to  the 
second  stage  of  the  individualistic  revolt  in  German 
literature.  Klopstock  exerted,  as  we  have  seen,  a  more 
immediate  influence  on  his  contemporaries  as  a  lyric 
poet  and  as  a  discoverer  of  German  antiquity  than  as 
the  poet  of  the  Messias ;  and  it  was  from  the  fermenta- 
tion of  Klopstock's  lyric  that  the  quieter  more  reflective 
poetry  of  the  "  Gottinger  Hain "  or  "  Dichterbund " 
emerged.  In  September  1772,  the  eventful  year  in 
which  Herder  and  Goethe  formulated  the  gospel  of 
"Sturm  und  Drang,"  a  number  of  young  Gottingen 
students  of  poetic  tastes  met  together  one  moonlight 
evening  at  Weende,  a  village  outside  Gottingen,  and 
founded  the  "  Bund  "  under  an  oak  -  tree  ;  friendship, 
patriotism,  freedom  —  these  were  the  watchwords  which 
they  inscribed  on  their  banner,  and  they  are  the  dominant 
notes  of  their  poetry.  On  the  whole,  however,  they  were 
not  militant  poets  ;  their  verse  is,  for  the  most  part, 
subdued  and  elegiac.  The  common  tie  which  bound 
them  together  in  the  early  years  was  the  Gottinger 


138  THE    GOTTINGER    DICHTERBUND. 

Musenalmanach,  which  had  been  founded  in  1770 
by  H.  C.  Boie  (1744-1806)  and  F.  W.  Cotter  (1746-97). 
These  two  men  had  not  had  in  view  a  particularly 
German  publication  ;  both,  and  especially  Cotter,  were 
French  in  their  tastes  ;  in  fact,  Cotter  was,  as  a  translator 
and  adapter  of  French  plays,  the  last  prominent  champion 
of  French  classicism  in  Germany.  Before  very  long,  how- 
ever, the  Gottinger  Musenalmanach  had  become  the  organ 
of  the  "  Gottinger  Hain  "  and  the  acknowledged  receptacle 
for  the  most  original  lyric  poetry  of  the  time. 

The  most  prominent  personality  in  this  group  was 
Johann  Heinrich  Voss  (1751-1826).  As  an  original 
poet,  Voss  rarely  rises  above  mediocrity,  but  his  life 
presents  a  picture  of  tough  determination  and  indomit- 
able energy  amidst  discouraging  conditions.  Boie  had 
made  it  possible  for  him,  after  a  childhood  of  extreme 
privation,  to  study  in  Gottingen,  where  he  devoted  himself 
to  classical  philology  ;  and  the  best  part  of  his  life  he 
spent  as  a  provincial  schoolmaster  at  Eutin,  eking  out 
his  living  by  the  scanty  pittance  of  his  pen.  At  last,  in 
1805,  his  worldly  position  was  improved  by  his  being 
appointed  Professor  at  Heidelberg,  where  he  died  in 
1826.  Voss  tried  his  hand  at  many  forms  of  poetry,  but 
lyric  inspiration  of  a  higher  kind  failed  him  ;  even  the 
simplicity  of  the  Volkslied  did  not  altogether  lie  within 
his  powers.  His  talent  was  one  of  seeing,  not  feeling, 
and  he  is  best  remembered  to-day  as  a  translator  of 
Homer  and  as  the  author  of  a  couple  of  idylls  which 
prepared  the  way  for  Goethe's  Hermann  und  Dorothea. 
Homers  Odyssee,  which  Voss  published  in  1781,  is  the 
most  successful  rendering  of  Homer  into  a  modern 
tongue,  and  it  is  successful  for  a  reason  similar  to  that 
which  made  Luther's  Bible  the  great  "  Volksbuch  "  of  the 
sixteenth  century.  Voss  succeeded  in  transferring  into 
modern  German  the  spirit  of  the  Greek  epic ;  he  has 
interpreted  it  by  the  light  of  that  primitive  peasant  life  he 
had  himself  lived  in  his  youth.  Others,  and  above  all, 
Goethe,  have  realised  better  the  poetic  capabilities  of  the 
German  hexameter,  as  a  reproduction  of  the  Greek 


VOSS   AND    HOLTY.  139 

epic  measure,  but  none  has  been  able  to  approach  the 
ancient  epic  in  so  unsophisticated  a  spirit  as  Voss.  His 
later  translations,  that  of  the  Iliad  (1793),  of  Hesiod,  or 
of  Shakespeare  (1818  ff.),  may  be  in  accuracy  superior 
to  the  first ;  but  they  fail  to  reproduce  so  faithfully  the 
spirit  of  their  originals.  Voss's  own  Idyllen  (first  collected 
edition  in  the  Gedichte,  1785)  gave  the  impression  of  being 
as  widely  separated  from  those  of  Gessner,  his  immediate 
predecessor  in  the  field,  as  the  German  social  novel  of  the 
time  is  from  the  pastorals  of  the  Renaissance.  The  two 
best,  Der  siebzigste  Geburtstag  (1781)  and  Luise  (1784), 
describe  simple,  everyday  happenings  in  the  life  of  the 
people,  the  former  a  birthday  celebration,  the  latter  the 
wedding  of  a  young  village  pastor,  with  a  realism  that  is 
at  times  almost  excessively  minute.  Voss  taught  his 
contemporaries  how  the  homely  world  of  the  novel  could 
be  raised  to  the  level  of  poetry ;  his  Idylls  are  an  inter- 
pretation in  terms  of  the  eighteenth  century  of  what  he 
learned  from  his  master,  Theocritus. 

More  inspired  than  Voss  was  Ludwig  Holty  (1748-76), 
who  died  of  consumption  at  the  age  of  twenty-eight; 
Holty  was  a  gentle,  melancholy  dreamer  who  bathed  the 
artificial  anacreontics  of  an  earlier  day  in  a  flood  of  senti- 
ment, and  infused  the  classic  measures  of  Uz  with  an 
enthusiasm  for  nature.  The  elegiac  note,  which  was 
common  to  the  majority  of  the  group,  pervades  all  his 
verse.  Another  member  of  the  "  Bund  "  was  J.  M.  Miller 
(1750-1814),  a  Swabian  theological  student,  who  wrote 
lyrics  that  have  justly  become  Volkslieder,  and  a  novel, 
Szegwarf(iTj6),  inspired,  as  will  be  seen  in  the  following 
chapter,  by  Goethe's  Werther.  The  two  brothers,  Christian 
and  Friedrich  zu  Stolberg  (1748-1821  and  1750-1819), 
joined  the  "Bund"  a  few  months  after  its  consecration 
at  Weende.  In  1779  they  published  together  a  volume 
of  Gedichte,  poems  which,  for  the  most  part,  turn  round 
the  poles  of  patriotism  and  freedom  ;  but  their  fervour  is 
more  conspicuous  than  their  poetic  gifts.  Both  brothers 
also  distinguished  themselves  in  later  life  as  translators 
from  the  Greek. 


140  THE    GOTTINGER    DICHTERBUND. 

To  the  same  transition -.phase  in  German  literature, 
which  connects  Klopstock  with  the  "Sturm  und  Drang," 
belong  three  other  poets  who,  without  being  members  of 
the  "  Gottinger  Uichterbund,"  were  closely  allied  to  it. 
The  first  of  the  three,  Leopold  von  Gockingk  (1748- 
1828),  shows  that  same  kinship  with  the  older  anacreontic 
poets  that  is  noticeable  in  Holty,  but  this  feature  is  so 
pronounced  in  Gockingk  that  we  are  tempted  to  class  him 
rather  with  the  imitators  of  Hagedorn  and  Wieland  than 
with  the  Gottingen  disciples  of  Klopstock.  Gockingk 
possessed  the  same  fluent  mastery  of  versification  as 
Wieland,  and  he  excelled  in  the  poetic  "  epistle."  More 
akin  to  Voss  is  the  Holsteiner,  Matthias  Claudius  (1740- 
1815),  whose  simple,  unassuming  piety  won  for  him  a 
popularity  not  unsimilar  to  that  of  Gellert  in  an  earlier 
generation.  Nowadays,  it  is  true,  we  are  inclined  to 
detect  a  certain  affectation  in  Claudius's  constant  harping 
on  the  "  Volk  "  ;  the  "  Wandsbecker  Bote,"  as  he  was 
called  after  the  journal  he  edited  for  more  than  four  years 
(I77I~75)>  found  it  to  his  advantage  to  accentuate  the 
role  of  "popular"  poet  which  his  patrons  imposed  upon 
him.  At  the  same  time,  there  is  much  that  is  still  in- 
teresting— genuine  popular  songs  and  amiable  sketches 
of  provincial  life — in  his  works,  which  he  collected  for  the 
first  time  in  1775  under  the  extraordinary  title  of  Asmus 
omnia  secum  portans. 

Greater  than  either  of  these,  and  more  influential  than 
all  the  other  Gottingen  writers  together,  was  the  third 
poet  that  has  to  be  considered,  Gottfried  August  Burger 
(1747-94).  Biirger  stands,  moreover,  nearer  to  the 
"Sturm  und  Drang  "than  any  of  the  others.  Domestic 
miseries  and  petty  economic  struggles  made  up  his 
life,  and  his  passionate  temperament  was  in  permanent 
conflict  with  the  narrow  provincialism  amidst  which 
he  had  to  live.  This  poet,  whose  fame  was  for  a  time 
European,  was  compelled  to  struggle  through  life  as  an 
ill-paid  official  in  a  small  German  village,  and,  later,  as  an 
unpaid  professor  in  the  university  of  Gottingen.  It  was 
Burger's  supreme  merit  to  have  created,  on  the  model  of 


,  BURGER'S  BALLADS.  141 

the  Percy  Ballads,  which  awakened  an  enthusiasm  in 
Germany  second  only  to  that  of  Ossian,  the  national 
German  ballad.  At  one  stroke  he  leapt  into  fame  with 
his  famous  Lenore  (1773),  a  b^^cl  which  kindled  the  im- 
agination df  Sir ""Walter  Scott  and  of  many  another  young 
poet  in  every  literature  of  Europe ;  indeed,  Burger's 
Lenore  was  hardly  less  far-reaching  in  its  influence  than 
Goethe's  Werther  itself.  Wilhelm,  Lenore's  lover,  has 
fallen  in  the  battle  of  Prague,  and  she,  despairing  of  his 
return,  rebels  against  God's  providence.  But  in  the 
night  her  Wilhelm  does  return  ;  his  horse  is  at  the  door  : 
he  bids  her  mount  behind  him.  Then  begins  the  wild 
ride  through  the  night,  a  ride  as  fearful  as  that  of 
the  "  wilde  Jager  "  himself.  At  last  the  goal  is  reached, 
and  Lenore's  companion  reveals  himself  as  a  skeleton 
with  hook  and  hour-glass.  So  great  was  the  fame  of  this 
ballad  that  Burger's  other  poems  have  been  unduly  over- 
shadowed by  it.  But  Das  Lied  vom  braven  Mann  (1777), 
Des  Pfarrers  Tochter  von  Taubenheim  (1781),  and,  above 
all,  Der  wtlde  Jager  (1778),  deserve  almost  as  high  a 
place  as  Lenore  in  the  ballad-literature  of  the  eighteenth 
century. 

Burger's  literary  achievement  is  virtually  restricted  to 
his  ballads,  his  other  poetry  being  of  minor  importance. 
His  influence  was  not  only  immediate,  but  also  lasting  ; 
and  it  denned  to  some  extent  the  poetic  activity  of 
the  Romantic  School  at  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth 
century.  A.  W.  Schlegel  was  proud  to  acknowledge 
Burger  as  the  master  to  whom  he  owed  most  when,  as  a 
young  student,  he  sat  at  his  feet  in  Gottingen. 


142 


CHAPTER    XIV. 

GOETHE    AND    THE    "  STURM    UND    DRANG." 

THE  period  in  German  literature  which  is  known  as  the 
"  Geniezeit,"  or  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang,"  was  the  most 
national  German  phenomenon  of  the  eighteenth  century  ; 
it  was  the  natural  consequence  of  that  outburst  of  lyricism 
and  individualism  with  which  Klopstock  had  broken 
down  the  literary  formalism  of  classicism.  Lessing  and 
Wieland,  it  is  true,  were  retarding  moments  in  its  de- 
velopment, but  the  spirit  of  the  time  was  too  strong 
even  for  them.  In  Herder  the  Germanic  forces  burst 
out  afresh,  and  with  a  vigour  before  which  Lessing's  and 
Wieland's  classicism  could  avail  little.  In  a  larger  sense, 
however,  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang "  was  only  a  manifes- 
tation of  a  movement  that  was  European,  the  German 
form  of  the  individualistic  revolt,  the  rebirth  of  sentiment 
and  the  return  to  nature,  which  had  begun  in  England 
and  found  its  greatest  exponent  in  the  Swiss  writer, 
Rousseau. 

For  the  actual  beginnings  of  the  "  Geniezeit "  we  are 
obliged  to  go  back  to  men  like  Hamann  and  Herder,  and 
in  its  later  stages  we  find  the  movement  passing  gradually 
into  Romanticism  proper  at  the  close  of  the  century. 
It  is,  however,  convenient  to  regard  the  period  .of  revolt  as 
extending  from  Herder's  Fragmente  in  1767  to  Schiller's 
Don  Carlos  in  1787  :  it  may  be  conceived  pictorially  as 
forming  an  ellipse,  of  which  these  two  works  mark  the 
two  extremes  of  the  periphery,  while  the  poles  round 
which  the  ellipse  turns  are  Goethe's  Gotz  von  Berlich- 


THE    STURM    UND    DRANG.  143 

ingen, ,  which  appeared  six  years  after  the  Fragmente,  and 
Schiller's  Rauber^  which  appeared  six  years  before  Don 
Carlos. 

Amongst  the  pioneers  of  the  new  movement  may  be 
numbered,  besides  those  already  mentioned,  J.  K.  Lavater 
(1741-1801),  who  infused  a  spirit  of  individualism  into  the 
religious  life  of  the  time,  and  F.  H.  Jacobi  (1743-1819), 
who  interpreted  Spinoza  in  the  light  of  the  new  senti- 
mentalism.  Lavater  followed,  as  a  poet,  in  the  train 
of  Klopstock  with  dreary  religious  epics,  but  he  is  only 
remembered  to-day,  if  he  is  remembered  at  all,  by  his 
Physiognomische  Fragmente  zur  Beforderung  der  Men- 
schenkenntnis  und  Menschenliebe  (1775-78),  a  characteristic 
product  of  "Sturm  und  Drang"  humanitarianism.  The 
criticism  of  the  period  was  inaugurated  by  a  follower 
of  Klopstock,  H.  W.  von  Gerstenberg  (1737-1823), 
whose  Briefe  uber  Merkwilrdigkeiten  der  Literatur  ap- 
peared in  1766  and  1767;  Gerstenberg  also  gave 
the  "Sturm  und  Drang"  its  first  characteristic  drama, 
the  harrowing  psychological  tragedy  of  Ugolino  (1768). 
It  was  Goethe,  however,  who  first  brought  aim  and 
order  into  the  ideas  of  the  movement  and  laid  down 
the  lines  on  which  it  was  to  develop. 

The  childhood  of  Johann  Wolfgang  Goethe,  who  was 
born  at  Frankfort  -  on^-" the  -  Main  on  August  29,  1749, 
was  sunny  and  idyllic.  His  imagination  was  early  kindled 
by  the  stories  of  the  Old  Testament  and  the  Messias,  by 
the  pageant  of  an  old-world  coronation  of  a  German 
emperor  in  the  Frankfort  town-hall ;  while  a  marionette- 
theatre,  and  later  the  French  players  who  performed 
regularly  during  the  French  occupation  of  the  town  in 
J759>  brought  him  under  the  spell  of  the  theatre.  His 
home  itself,  the  roomy  patrician  house  in  the  Grosse 
Hirschgraben,  offered  variety  and  stimulus  enough  ;  his 
mother,  bright  and  happy  by  nature,  being  the  real  com- 
panion of  his  early  years.  Two  episodes  in  particular 
stood  out  in  Goethe's  later  memories,  the  quartering  of 
the  French  Count  Thoranc,  a  man  of  refined  artistic 
tastes,  on  his  father's  house  during  the  Seven  Years'  War, 


144    GOETHE  AND  THE  STURM  UND  DRANG. 

and  his  first  love-affair,  the  heroine  of  which  perhaps  gave 
her  name  to  Gretchen  in  Faust. 

Goethe's  f7rsT"*glimpse  of  the  great  world  outside  of 
Frankfort  was  gained  as  a  student  of  the  university 
of  Leipzig,  where  he  spent  the  years  1765-68.  He 
learned  his  art  in  the  literary  milieu  that  had  been 
created  by  Gotcsched  and  Gellert ;  he  wrote  dramas  in 
alexandrines  (Die  Laune  des  Verliebten,  1768;  Die 
Mitschuldigen,  1769),  and  love-songs  in  the  light,  ana- 
creontic tone  which  the  polished  society  of  Leipzig  appre- 
ciated ;  the  Frankfort  Gretchen  was  forgotten  for  Kath- 
chen  Schonkopf,  the  daughter  of  a  Leipzig  wine  -  mer- 
chant, who  taught  Goethe  what  jealousy  was  as  well 
as  love.  An  illness  brought  his  light-hearted  student 
days  to  an  abrupt  conclusion,  and  in  the  hours  of  slow 

recovery    in    Frankfort   he   busied   himself  with    Lessing^. 

Shakespeare,  and  Rousseau,  and  sought  a  key  to  the 
mysteries  of  life  ifPalche'my  and  mysticism.  ~WEen  ~rle" 
recovered,  his  father  proposed  that,  instead  of  returning 
to  Leipzig,  he  should  complete  his  legal  studies  at 
Strassburg. 

In  the  seventeen  months  which  Goethe  spent  in  Strass- 
burg— the  most  intensely  lived  period  of  his  whole  life — he 
became  a  poet  and  the  leader  of  his  time.  In  Strassburg 
he  found  his  feet  at  once  ;  at  the  table  where  he  dined 
there  were  congenial  friends,  amongst  them  Heinrich 
Jung  Stilling  (1740-1817),  whose  autobiography,  a  strange 
monument  of  practical  pietism,  is  still  a  German  "  Volks- 
buch."  A  month  or  two  later  Herder  arrived  in  Strass- 
burg, the  Herder  whose  Fragmente  was  the  key  to  the 
new  world  on  the  threshold  of  which  Goethe  stood. 
The  influence  of  Herder  on  the  young  poet  was  magical ; 
the  new,  vague  ideas  which  were  surging  in  him,  at 
once  took  visible  shape  ;  Herder  communicated  to  him 
his  own  revolutionary  ideas  of  history,  of  the  "  Volk," 
whose  heart  stood  revealed  in  its  songs ;  he  taught  him 
to  understand  what  he  had  hitherto  only  felt,  the  beauty 
of  the  Gothic  cathedral  that  towered  above  him,  and  of 
the  poet  who  was  to  mean  so  much  to  German  poetry  in 


GOETHE    IN    STRASSBURG.  145 

this  age,  Shakespeare.  Simultaneously  with  Herder's 
influence,  another  experience  awakened  the  poet  in 
Goethe,  his  love  for  Friederike  Brion,  daughter  of  the 
pastor  of  Sesenheim,  an  Alsatian  village  some  twenty 
miles  to  the  north  of  Strassburg.  It  is  possible  that 
Goethe,  looking  back  on  this  idyll  of  his  youth  from 
the  heights  of  maturer  years,  saw  it  through  too  poetic 
a  veil, — saw  it  with  the  eyes  of  an  author,  who  stood 
near  to  him  in  his  Strassburg  days,  Oliver  Goldsmith. 
But  the  lyrics  and  letters  to  Friederike,  show  that  there 
is,  after  all,  more  "Wahrheit"  than  "Dichtung"  in  the 
description  of  the  episode  in  the  tenth  and  eleventh 
books  of  the  poet's  autobiography.  In  the  Sesenheimer 
Lieder — songs  in  which  the  artificial  anacreontic  passes 
insensibly  into  a  lyric  of  genuine  emotion — Goethe  first 
revealed  himself  as  a  poet  of  the  first  rank.  That  the 
romance  would  end  tragically  was  to  have  been  fore- 
seen ;  neither  the  Alsatian  country  girl  nor  the  young 
poet,  who  already  dimly  realised  that  no  common  destiny 
was  marked  out  for  him,  could  have  been  happy.  The 
breach  had  to  come,  and  it  plunged  both  in  despair ; 
Friederike's  life  was  broken,  and  Goethe,  in  the  restless 
agony  of  his  Wanderers  Sturmlied,  himself  experienced 
the  tragic  conflicts  which  lie  behind  the  works  he  wrote 
in  the  next  few  years. 

In  the  autumn  of  1771  he  returned  to  Frankfort  to 
begin  his  practical  initiation  into  the  business  of  an 
advocate,  and  in  the  following  spring  he  spent  a  few 
months  in  Wetzlar,  then  the  seat  of  the  Imperial  law 
courts.  Here  another  love-affair,  that  with  Charlotte 
Buff,  the  betrothed  of  a  young  colleague,  J.  C.  Kestner, 
once  more  disturbed  his  equanimity.  A  visit  to  the 
Rhine  and  the  new  acquaintances  he  made  there  helped 
to  mitigate  his  grief  at  parting  from  Lotte,  and  on  his 
return  to  Frankfort  he  threw  himself  with  increased 
energy  into  literary  work.  During  the  next  few  years 
he  formulated  the  creed  of  the  new  literary  movement 
in  his  own  contributions  to  the  Frankfurter  Gelehrte 
Anzeigen  (1772-73),  and  in  his  share  in  Herder's  Von 

K 


146    GOETHE  AND  THE  STURM  UNO  DRANG. 

deutscher  Art  und  Knnst ;  and  in  1773  and  1774  Goethe 
published  two  works  of  the  very  first  importance  •r'Gotz 
von  Berlichingen  and  Die  Leiden  des  jungen  Werther. 

The  first  of  these  was  the  immediate  outcome  of 
his  study  of  Shakespeare,  the  second  of  his  study 
of  Rousseau.  Gotz  von  Berlichingen  is  a  historical 
tragedy  of  the  Reformation  period,  a  restless,  loosely 
constructed  dramatic  chronicle  ;  a  work  overflowing  with 
spontaneous,  unrestrained  strength.  It  bids  defiance  to 
all  unities  except  the  unity  imposed  on  the  drama  by 
its  hero,  and  by  the  poet's  own  enthusiasm  for  the 
strong  man  who  combines  love  of  freedom  with  a  wide- 
hearted  humanity.  At  the  opening  of  the  drama  Gotz 
von  Berlichingen  has  taken  his  former  schoolmate, 
Adalbert  von  Weisslingen,  prisoner,  Weisslingen  being 
an  adherent  of  the  Bishop  of  Bamberg,  with  whom 
Gotz  is  at  feud.  In  Gotz's  castle  at  Jaxthausen,  Weiss- 
lingen sees  and  loves  Gotz's  sister  Maria,  and  resolves 
for  her  sake  to  break  with  the  bishop  and  join  Gotz. 
He  returns  to  Bamberg  to  put  his  affairs  in  order,  and 
there  falls  a  victim  to  the  intrigues  of  his  former  friends. 
He  forgets  Maria  in  Jaxthausen  and  marries  Adelheid  von 
Walldorf,  a  court  beauty.  Meanwhile  Gotz  has  put  him- 
self at  the  head  of  the  peasants'  revolt,  and  on  their 
defeat  is  condemned  to  die  at  Weisslingen's  hands. 
Maria  begs  Weisslingen  to  save  her  brother  for  the 
sake  of  their  old  love  ;  he  tears  the  sentence,  but  him- 
self dies,  poisoned  by  his  own  wife.  Adelheid  is 
condemned  by  the  Holy  Vehmgericht,  and  Gotz  suc- 
cumbs to  his  wounds. 

Gotz  von  Berlichingen  was  published  in  1773,  although 
in  its  first  form  it  was  completed  somewhat  earlier,  and  in 
the  following  year  appeared  Die  Leiden  des  jungen  Werther. 
Perhaps  the  greatest  tribute  to  Goethe's  genius  at  this 
time  is  the  fact  that  his  second  masterpiece  is  so  entirely 
different  from  its  predecessor.  While  Gotz  was  a  histori- 
cal drama,  or,  at  least,  dealt  with  a  historical  theme, 
Werther  is  an  immediate,  personal  "confession."  It  is 
a  poetic  interpretation,  in  the  spirit  of  Rousseau's  La 


"WERTHERS    LEIDEN."  147 

nouvelle  Helo'ise,  of  the  crisis  through  which  the  poet  had 
himself  passed  in  Wetzlar.  While  Gotz  laid  the  basis  for 
a  national  German  literature,  Werther  gave  that  literature 
an  interest  that  was  cosmopolitan.  Reality  is  but  little 
veiled  in  this  novel  in  letters  ;  Werther  with  his  passionate 
love  for  nature,  his  absorption  in  Homer  and  Ossian,  is 
Goethe's  self  displayed  in  the  light  of  eighteenth-century 
sentimentalism.  Werther  loves  Lotte,  the  betrothed  of 
his  friend  Albert,  as  Goethe  had  loved  Kestner's  fiancee, 
although  no  doubt  other  loves  and  other  experiences 
are  in  the  novel  consciously  and  unconsciously  inter- 
woven ;  Werther's  passion  gains  the  upper  hand ;  he  bor- 
rows his  friend's  pistols  and  shoots  himself.  Werthers 
Leiden  was  the  most  popular  European  novel  of  its 
day,  and  still  lives,  even  after  its  sentimentalism  has  grown 
old-fashioned  and  effete,  by  the  vividness  and  truth  of  its 
characterisation. 

With  these  two  works  the  new  era  was  fairly  inaugur- 
ated ;  Goethe's  further  contributions  to  the  literature  of 
"  Sturm  und  Drang  "  were  of  comparatively  minor  im- 
portance. He  gave  voice  to  the  new  ideas  in  dramatic 
satires  such  as  Goiter,  Helden  und  Wieland,  and  Satyros  ; 
he  pled  for  the  dignity  of  the  artist's  calling  in  frag- 
mentary dramatic  scenes  (Kiinstlers  Erdewallen,  Kiinstlers 
Apotheose) ;  he  planned  an  epic  on  Der  ewige  Jude, 
dramas  on  Sokrates,  Mahomet,  and  Prometheus,  a  noble 
fragment  from  the  last-named  drama  dating  from  1773. 
Two  plays,  Clavigo  and  Stella,  appeared  respectively  in 
1774  and  1776;  both  mark  a  descent  from  the  lofty 
political  enthusiasm  of  Gotz  von  Berlichingen  in  the  direc- 
tion of  the  "domestic  tragedy";  but  both  show  an 
advance  towards  a  more  practical  and  effective  dramatic 
technique.  And,  like  Werther,  both  are  "  confessions  "  of 
the  poet's  own  troubled  heart.  These  plays  were  finished, 
but  another,  and  the  greatest  of  all,  Faust,  was  to  remain 
a  fragment  until  the  close  of  Goethe's  life.  The  kernel 
of  the  First  Part  of  Faust,  Faust's  despairing  im- 
peachment of  life,  and  all  the  scenes  of  the  Gretchen 
tragedy — scenes  that  we  now  reckon  among  the  most  in- 


148    GOETHE  AND  THE  STURM  UNO  DRANG. 

tensely  tragic  in  the  whole  range  of  dramatic  literature 
— were  already  written  before  Goethe  left  Frankfort  for 
Weimar  at  the  close  of  1775. 

Before  following  Goethe's  life  further,  we  must  turn 
to  consider  the  literary  movement  which  he  had  in- 
augurated so  brilliantly.  The  "  Sturm  und  Drang "  was 
pre-eminently  an  age  of  dramatic  literature,  and  the 
theatre  the  arena  in  which  the  young  writers  of  the  day 
fought  out  their  battles.  Of  the  group  of  dramatists 
immediately  associated  with  Goethe  at  this  time,  the 
most  gifted  was  J.  M.  R.  Lenz  (1751-92),  who  had  been 
in  Strassburg  at  the  same  time  as  Goethe  ;  indeed,  it  was 
Lenz's  weakness  and  misfortune  that  he  tried  all  his  life 
to  wander  in  Goethe's  footsteps.  His  dramas,  of  which 
the  best  are  Der  Hofmeister  (1774)  and  Die  Soldaten 
(1776),  present  vivid,  realistic  pictures,  in  which  con- 
temporary life  and  manners  are  regarded  from  an  often 
cynical  and  satiric  standpoint.  Like  all  these  young 
writers,  Lenz  was  a  fervid  admirer  of  Shakespeare  ;  his 
Anmerkungen  iibers  Theater  (1774),  which  was  accom- 
panied by  a  prose  translation  of  Shakespeare's  Love's 
Labour's  Lost  under  the  title  Amor  vincit  omnia,  provides 
a  key  to  the  dramaturgic  ideas  which  actuated  the  "  Sturm 
und  Drang  " ;  it  also  supplements  the  Briefe  iiber  Merk- 
wurdigkeiten  der  Literatur  (1766-67),  by  H.  W.  von 
Gerstenberg  (1737-1823),  which  have  already  been  men- 
tioned. But  in  Lenz's  own  dramas  he  has  learned  little 
from  Shakespeare  except  how  to  free  himself  from  the 
tyranny  of  the  rules  ;  and  the  main  sources  from  which 
he  drew  the  ideas  behind  his  plays  were  Rousseau  and 
Diderot.  Among  the  playwrights  of  the  "Sturm  und 
Drang  "  Lenz  was,  however,  second  only  to  Goethe  in  the 
art  of  peopling  his  dramas  with  real,  living  figures  ;  he 
does  not  give  us  merely  puppets  declaiming  extravagant 
ideas.  Revolting  as  his  scenes  at  times  are  in  their  out- 
spoken realism,  they  maintain  their  hold  on  us  by  virtue 
of  this  creative  power. 

The  genius  of  F.  M.  von  Klinger  (1752-1831)  was  more 
akin  to  that  of  Schiller  than  of  Goethe  ;  that  is  to  say,  he  was 


LENZ    AND    KLINGER. 


149 


not  so  conspicuously  a  creator  as  an  enthusiast  for  ideas. 
In  character  he  was  more  manly  and  steadfast  than  Lenz, 
and  although  "Sturm  und  Drang"  carried  him  at  the 
time  more  completely  off  his  feet,  it  was  but  a  passing 
phase  in  his  development.  In  this  first  period  of  his  life 
Klinger  appears  to  most  advantage  in  Der  Wirrwarr,  oder 
Sturm  und  Drang  (i  7  7 6),  the  play  which  gave  the  move- 
ment its  name,  and  Die  Zwillinge  (1776).  In  these 
tragedies  all  technical  considerations  are  forgotten  in  the 
sweep  of  unbridled  passion;  the  characters  may  be  in- 
conceivable, the  events  impossible,  but  we  are  impressed 
by  the  earnestness  of  the  author  himself;  these  plays 
are  like  magnificent  nightmares,  in  which  we  cannot  but 
believe  as  long  as  we  are  under  their  spell.  Die  Zwillinge 
is  a  drama  on  the  favourite  theme  of  the  age,  a  theme  that 
was  to  some  extent  suggested  by  the  social  conditions  of 
the  eighteenth  century,  that  of  hatred  between  two  brothers. 
It  won  the  prize  in  a  competition  for  the  best  German 
tragedy,  although,  to  modern  tastes,  another  drama  offered 
for  the  same  competition,  Julius  von  Tarent  (1776),  by 
J.  A.  Leisewitz  (1752-1806),  a.  protege  of  the  Gottinger 
Bund,  seems  to  have  a  better  claim  to  it.  Julius  von 
Tarent  is  a  more  carefully  thought  out  and  more  restrained 
work  than  the  impulsive  products  of  Klinger's  genius,  a 
tragedy  that  owed  more  to  Emilia  Galotti  than  to  Gotz  von 
Berlichingen.  In  later  life,  Klinger,  who  in  1780  entered 
the  Russian  military  service  and  ultimately  rose  to  high 
honours,  entirely  outgrew  the  restlessness  of  his  early 
period  and  wrote  a  series  of  nine  philosophical  novels 
(1791-1805),  in  which  the  cry  of  personal  revolt  gave 
place  to  a  calmer  quest  for  a  solution  to  the  problems 
that  had  caused  the  turmoil  of  his  youth ;  in  their 
ideas  and  tendencies  these  novels  belong,  no  less  than 
the  maturer  work  of  Goethe  and  Schiller,  to  the  classic 
phase  of  German  literature. 

Less  important  than  the  two  writers  who  have  just  been 
discussed  was  H.  L.  Wagner  (1747-79),  whose  dramas, 
and  notably  Die  Kindermorderin  (1776),  are  the  first  step 
on  the  downward  path  which  led  from  the  tragedy  of 


150    GOETHE  AND  THE  STURM  UND  DRANG. 

"  Sturm  und  Drang "  to  the  moving  sentimental  pictures 
of  domestic  life  which  Iffland  and  Kotzebue  produced. 
More  interesting  is  Friedrich,  or,  as  he  preferred  to  be 
called,  "Maler"  Miiller  (1749-1825),  who  forms  a  link 
not  so  much  between  "Sturm  und  Drang"  and  the  later 
Romanticism,  as  between  the  old-world  sentimentalism  of 
Gessner's  idylls  and  Klopstock's  early  odes  on  the  one 
hand,  and  the  Romantic  poetry  of  Tieck  on  the  other. 
His  Fausts  Leben  dramatisiert  (1778)  belongs,  however, 
to  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang "  not  merely  because  it  is 
written  with  unshaken  faith  in  Shakespeare,  but  also  be- 
cause it  gives  voice  to  the  favourite  theme  of  the  move- 
ment, the  effort  of  the  strong  -man  to  obtain  the  mastery 
of  life.  His  much  later  play,  Golo  und  Genoveva  (1781, 
but  not  published  till  1811),  is  one  of  the  best  of  the 
so-called  "  Ritterdramen,"  the  degenerate  successors  to 
Gotz  von  Berlichingen. 

In  the  history  of  the  drama  under  the  influence  of  the 
later  "  Sturm  und  Drang,"  three  clearly  marked  tendencies 
may  be  traced :  these  are,  first,  a  rapid  development 
of  the  "  Ritterdrama  "  just  mentioned ;  secondly,  an  in- 
creasing popularity  of  the  "  biirgerliche  Tragodie,"  which, 
without  belying  its  origins,  learned  much  from  later  French 
writers  like  Diderot  and  Sebastien  Mercier ;  and  lastly,  an 
increase  in  the  prestige  of  the  German  theatre  coupled 
with  the  rise  of  an  essentially  actor's  drama.  Representa- 
tive writers  of  the  "  Ritterdrama,"  which  found  a  strong- 
hold in  Munich,  were  Graf  J.  A.  von  Torring  (1753-1826), 
J.  M.  Babo  (1756-1822),  and  F.  J.  H.  von  Soden  (1754- 
1831).  The  later  "  biirgerliche  Tragodie  "  was  cultivated 
by,  amongst  others,  O.  H.  von  Gemmingen  (1755-1836), 
whose  Der  deirfsche  Hausvater  (1780),  an  imitation  of 
Diderot's  Pere  de  famUle,  was  very  popular  and  prepared 
the  way  for  the  German  masterpiece  of  this  class  of  drama, 
Schiller's  Kabale  und  Liebe.  The  "  Nationaltheater  " 
of  Mannheim,  where  Schiller's  early  plays  were  per- 
formed for  the  first  time,  was  chiefly  associated  with  this 
type  of  play,  and  it  was  for  a  time,  when  A.  W.  Iffland 
(1759-1814)  was  its  leading  actor,  the  most  important 


THE    RISE    OF    THE    THEATRE.  151 

theatrical  focus  in  Germany.  Hamburg,  however,  still 
retained  a  certain  prestige,  and  that  in  spite  of  the 
failure  of  Lessing  and  his  friends  to  establish  there  a 
national  theatre,  and  under  F.  L.  Schroder  (1744-1816), 
the  greatest  German  actor  of  the  eighteenth  century,  it 
assumed  once  more  the  leading  role  in  theatrical  matters. 
Both  Iffland  and  Schroder  wrote  dramas,  the  former  real- 
istic plays  of  everyday  life,  moralising  and  sentimental 
as  the  public  of  the  day  demanded,  but  by  no  means 
devoid  of  higher  literary  interest ;  while  the  latter,  with 
less  literary  pretensions,  translated  and  adapted  plays 
from  the  English.  Schroder's  chief  merit  remains,  how- 
ever, the  fact  that  he  laid  the  foundations  of  the  modern 
theatre,  and  gave  Shakespeare  his  place,  once  and  for  all 
in  Germany,  at  the  head  of  the  classic  repertory.  In  this 
respect  the  performance  of  Hamlet  in  Hamburg  under 
Schroder's  auspices,  on  September  20,  1776,  marks  the 
beginning  of  a  new  era  in  the  history  of  the  German 
stage. 

In  this  same  year  Joseph  II.  practically  laid  the  founda- 
tion of  what  was  subsequently  to  become  the  greatest  of  all 
German  theatres,  the  "  Hofburgtheater  "  in  Vienna.  In 
literary  respects,  however,  Austria  still  lagged  considerably 
behind  North  Germany  ;  the  Viennese  theatre  depended  for 
its  repertoire  on  centres  like  Hamburg,  Gotha,  and  Mann- 
heim, its  own  contributions  being  limited  to  alexandrine 
tragedies  by  C.  H.  von  Ayrenhoff  (i  733-1819),  who  can 
only  be  regarded  as  a  belated  follower  of  Gottsched,  and 
to  imitations  of  North  German  plays,  especially  of  Minna 
von  Barnhelm.  But  in  the  music  -  drama  Vienna  had 
already  begun  to  lead  the  way ;  Gluck  had  been  suc- 
ceeded by  W.  A.  Mozart  (1756-91),  whose  masterworks, 
Die  Hochzeit  des  Figaro  (1786),  Don  Juan  (1787),  and 
Die  Zauberflote  (1791) — the  two  former  plays  of  Italian 
origin,  the  latter  a  genuine  "  Volksposse  " — were  all  pro- 
duced in  Austria. 

The  influence  of  Werthers  Leiden  was,  if  anything, 
more  immediate  than  that  of  Gotz.  Goethe's  novel  called 
forth  an  endless  flood  of  sentimental  fiction,  of  which  J.  M. 


152   GOETHE  AND  THE  STURM  UND  DRANG. 

Miller's  Siegwart  (1776)  and  F.  H.  Jacobi's  Woldemar 
(1777-79)  —  the  one  lachrymose  and  sentimental,  the 
other  sentimental  and  philosophic  —  may  be  taken  as 
representative  types  ;  but  Werther  also  infused  a  new  spirit 
into  the  older  family  novel  and  into  the  pedagogic  fiction 
which  Rousseau  had  brought  into  vogue.  Gradually, 
however,  the  novel  emancipated  itself  from  the  leading- 
strings  of  the  "Sturm  und  Drang."  J.  J.  Heinse  (1749- 
1803),  a  strange,  undisciplined  genius,  who  was  really 
more  akin  to  Wieland  than  to  the  sentimentalists,  illustrates 
this  transition  ;  in  his  Ardinghello,  oder  die  gliickseligen 
Inseln  (1787)  he  expressed  that  yearning  of  the  German 
soul  for  Italy  and  enthusiasm  for  Italian  art  which  from 
now  on  are  constant  factors  in  the  literary  and  artistic 
life  of  Germany.  His  second  novel,  Hildegard  von 
Hohental  (1795-96),  deals  mainly  with  music,  but,  like 
the  first,  it,  too,  is  disfigured  by  emotional  excesses 
and  extravagances.  Both  books,  however,  are  clearly 
forerunners  of  the  fiction  of  the  Romanticists.  Trans- 
itional, too,  is  another  outstanding  novel  of  this 
epoch,  Anton  Reiser  (1785-90),  by  K.  Ph.  Moritz 
(1757-93):  an  autobiography  rather  than  a  work  of 
the  imagination,  Anton  Reiser  stands,  if  only  by  virtue  of 
the  importance  its  author  attaches  to  the  psychological 
side  of  his  story,  midway  between  Wieland's  Agatkon  and 
Goethe's  Wilhelm  Meister. 

Two  other  writers  have  to  be  mentioned  before  we 
leave  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang,"  Forster  and  Seume.  Both 
belong  to  what  might  be  called  the  outermost  limit  of 
that  movement.  J.  G.  Forster  (1754-94)  accompanied 
Cook  on  his  second  voyage  round  the  world.  It  is  not, 
however,  his  account  of  that  voyage — which  was  written  in 
English — but  his  masterly  Ansichten  vom  Niederrhein,  von 
Brabant,  Flandern,  Holland,  England  und  Frankreich 
(1791),  which  assures  him  a  place  in  literary  history.  It 
would  almost  seem  as  if  a  century  of  literary  evolution 
lay  between  the  sentimental  journeys  of  writers  like 
Thiimmel  and  Nicolai,  and  this  faithful  and  painstaking 


FORSTER    AND    SEUME.  153 

description — written  in  a  masterly  prose  style — of  the 
nature  and  the  art  of  these  lands.  Like  so  many  of  the 
German  idealists  of  this  age,  Forster  came  intellectually 
to  grief  on  the  French  Revolution.  Beyond  it  he  could 
only  see  a  blank  of  disruption  and  anarchy,  and  he 
died  in  1794,  before  the  development  of  events  could 
bring  him  either  consolation  or  hope.  J.  G.  Seume 
(1763-1810)  belonged  to  a  still  later  generation,  but 
his  passionate  hatred  of  tyranny  and  his  humanitarian 
rationalism  have  more  in  common  with  the  ideas  of 
Rousseau  and  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang  "  than  of  the  later 
Romanticists.  His  writings,  the  famous  Spaziergang  nach 
Syrakus  im  Jahre  1802  (1803),  Mein  Sommer  (1806),  and 
Mein  Leben  (1813),  are  mainly  autobiographic,  and  give 
vivid  glimpses  into  a  life  that  had  more  than  its  share 
of  vicissitude  and  adventure. 


154 


CHAPTER     XV. 

SCHILLER  ;  GOETHE'S  FIRST  PERIOD  IN  WEIMAR. 

THE  fact  that  Goethe  and  Schiller  were  united  during  the 
best  years  of  both  their  lives  by  a  warm  friendship  has 
led  to  them  being  considered  as  parts  of  one  great, 
uniform  movement,  which  is  summed  up  in  the  word 
"classicism."  But,  in  reality,  the  two  poets  stood  in 
many  respects  at  opposite  poles ;  there  was  an  innate 
antagonism  in  their  natures  which  personal  intimacy 
never  removed.  The  conditions  under  which  they  had 
grown  up  were,  moreover,  as  different  as  possible.  Goethe 
was  born  almost  in  the  lap  of  luxury,  Schiller  was  the 
son  of  a  poor  army-surgeon  who  had  by  degrees  worked 
his  way  up  to  a  captaincy  in  the  Wiirtemberg  army ; 
Goethe's  childhood  was  passed  in  happy  carelessness, 
while  the  best  years  of  Schiller's  youth  were  spent  shut 
off  from  the  world  as  an  unwilling  captive  in  a  military 
school.  A  tragic  note  runs  all  through  Schiller's  life ; 
he  had  to  struggle  to  the  last  against  straitened  means 
and  ill-health  ;  every  step  he  gained  had  to  be  fought 
for,  every  advance  meant  a  scar ;  while  Goethe's  trials 
were  in  great  measure  what  we  might  call  of  his  own 
making ;  his  worldly  position  was  assured,  and  his  life 
unfolded  itself  harmoniously.  In  ripe  old  age  Goethe 
basked  in  Olympic  calm,  while  Schiller  remained  a  fighter 
to  the  end,  a  seeker  after  an  undiscovered  goal. 

Johann  Friedrich  Schiller  was  born  at  Marbach  on 
November  10,  1759  ;  his  childhood  was  passed  there,  at 
Lorch,  and  at  Ludwigsburg ;  his  early  tastes  inclined  him 


SCHILLER'S  "  RAUBEK."  155 

to  the  church  as  a  career,  but  the  Duke  of  Wiirtemberg 
laid  claim  on  the  promising  scholar  for  his  new  "  Military 
Academy "  at  the  "  Solitude "  near  Ludwigsburg,  where 
there  was  no  opportunity  for  theological  studies.  In  this 
school  Schiller  spent  seven  years,  from  1773  to  1780, 
first  with  a  view  to  a  career  as  a  jurist,  later,  when  the 
school  was  removed  to  Stuttgart,  as  a  medical  student. 
Much  as  the  Duke  of  Wiirtemberg  has  been  blamed  for 
his  tyrannical  treatment  of  the  young  poet,  it  may  be 
questioned  if  a  theological  training  would  have  fitted  him 
as  well  for  his  future  career  as  that  in  the  Duke's 
academy ;  here,  at  least,  he  had  a  glimpse  of  court  life, 
he  was  able  to  read  widely,  and  he  formed  passionate 
friendships.  Before  Schiller  left  the  academy  to  take 
up  an  unsatisfactory  position  in  Stuttgart  as  a  regimental 
doctor,  he  had  virtually  finished  his  first  drama,  Die 
Rduber.  It  was  privately  printed  in  1781,  and  performed 
^t  Mannheim  in  the  beginning  of  1782,  the  young  poet 
being  surreptitiously  present.  This  play  was,  as  we  have 
seen,  the  second  pole  round  which  the  movement  of 
"Sturm  und  Drang"  revolved;  it  stands  in  the  same 
relation  to  the  latter  half  of  that  movement  as  Go'tz  von 
Berlichingen  stood  to  the  earlier  half. 

The  idea  on  which  Die  Rduber  is  built  up — fraternal 
dissension — is  similar  to  that  of  Klinger's  Die  Zwillinge, 
Leisewitz's  Julius  von  Tarent,  and  other  revolutionary 
dramas  of  the  time.  Schiller  owed  the  story  to  his 
fellow-countryman  C.  F.  D.  Schubart  (1739-91),  a  poet 
akin  to  the  Gottingen  group,  whose  revolutionary  fervour 
had  to  be  expiated  by  ten  years'  imprisonment  in  the  Castle 
of  Hohenasperg.  Karl  Moor,  the  hero  of  Schiller's  play, 
is  a  student  in  Leipzig,  who  has  been  estranged  from  his 
father  by  the  machinations  of  his  villainous  brother  Franz  ; 
believing  that  his  father  has  disowned  him,  he  places 
himself  at  the  head  of  a  band  of  freebooters  in  the  Bo- 
hemian forest.  The  "Robber  Moor"  becomes  a  second 
Gotz,  helping  with  a  strong  arm  to  re-establish  justice  in 
tEe"  world.  He  longs,  however,  to  see  once  more  his 
home  and  his  betrothed,  Amalia,  and  returns  unan- 


156  SCHILLER. 

nounced.  He  finds  that  Franz  has  imprisoned  his  father 
in  a  tower  with  a  view  to  starving  him  to  death,  and  the 
old  man  is  only  rescued  to  die.  Franz  kills  himself,  and 
Karl  realises  that  in  fighting  against  human  iniquity, 
he  has  himself  sinned  against  the  eternal  laws  of  the 
world  ;  he  gives  himself  up  to  justice.  Perhaps  no  play 
of  this  eventful  time  mirrored  so  faithfully  the  ideas  and 
cravings  of  its  age  as  Die  Rduber ;  it  is  a  typical  em- 
bodiment of  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang  "  spirit,  a  document 
which,  read  aright,  foreshadows  even  the  coming  Revolu- 
tion in  France.  This  explains  its  power  over  contempor- 
aries ;  from  a  purely  literary  standpoint  it  is,  moreover,  a 
work  of  extraordinary  promise,  for  it  is  in  the  best  sense 
of  the  word  dramatic,  and  dominated  as  no  German 
tragedy  before  it,  not  even  Gotz  von  Berlichingen,  by 
a  genuine  tragic  fate. 

Schiller's  success  made  him  more  and  more  discon- 
tented with  his  miserable  lot  in  Stuttgart ;  as  appeals  to 
the  Duke  were  in  vain,  he  at  last  resolved  on  flight. 
On  the  22nd  of  September  1782  he  made  good  his 
escape  from  Wiirtemberg.  The  step  was  inevitable,  but 
it  plunged  him  in  serious  difficulties.  He  found  that 
the  Mannheim  National  Theatre,  on  which  he  had  pinned 
his  hopes,  had  no  position  to  offer  him  ;  and  for  a  time 
he  was  obliged  to  take  refuge  in  the  Thuringian  village  of 
Bauerbach,  where  he  put  the  finishing  touches  to  his 
second  drama,  Fiesco,  which  had  been  already  written  before 
he  left  StuttgafTprie  also  completed  here  a  third  drama, 
which  was  to  have  borne  the  title  Louise  Mitlerin,  and 
planned  a  fourth  on  the  subject  of  "Don  Carlos,  son  of 
Philip  II.  of  Spain.  In  1783,  however,  he  obtained  the 
coveted  appointment  of  "theatre  poet"  to  the  Mannheim 
Theatre  for  a  year,  and  here  -Fiesco  and  Louise  Millerin, 
or,  as  this  tragedy  was  rechristened  by  the  "actor  "TrHafTa, 
Kabale  und  Liebe^  were  performed  in  1783  and  1784. 
Both  these  plays  show  an  advance  on  Die  Rduber  in 
characterisation  and  construction,  but  neither  has  the 
elemental  power  of  the  first  play.  The  subject  of  Die 
Verschwbrung  des  Fiesco  zu  Genua,  the  conspiracy  of 


"FIESCO"  AND  "KABALE  UND  LIEBE."      157 

Fiasco  di  Lavagna  against  the  Dorias  in  Genoa  in  the 
sixteenth  century,  was,  compared  with  Die  Rauber,  an 
exceedingly  complicated  one,  for  it  involved  the  fate 
of  a  whole  republic  ;  the  theme  was  perhaps  still  some- 
what beyond  Schiller's  powers,  but  the  skill  with  which 
he  handled  its  many  threads  is  a  tribute  to  his  dramatic 
genius.  With  Kabale  und  Liebe,  the  first  great  love- 
tragedy  in  German  literature,  the  "  tragedy  of  common  life," 
which  Lessing  had  perfected  in  Emilia  Galotti,  reaches  its 
culminating  point.  For  his  background  the  poet  drew 
upon  a  world  he  knew,  the  court  of  Wiirtemberg.  By  more 
than  dubious  methods  President  von  Walter  has  gained 
control  of  the  affairs  of  a  small  German  Residenz,  and  he 
now  proposes  to  put  the  crown  to  his  efforts  by  marrying 
his  son  Ferdinand  to  the  Lady  Milford,  a  cast-off  mistress 
of  the  Prince.  Ferdinand,  however,  has  fallen  in  love 
with  Louise,  the  daughter  of  the  musician  Miller ;  and  the 
President,  to  thwart  his  son's  determination  to  marry  her, 
has  recourse  to  stratagem.  Louise  is  made  to  believe  that 
her  father's  life  depends  on  her  writing  a  letter  in  which  she 
appears  to  be  carrying  on  an  intrigue  with  a  foolish  court- 
official.  The  letter  is  played  into  Ferdinand's  hands,  and 
an  oath  prevents  Louise  making  explanations  until  she 
has  drunk  the  glass  of  poisoned  lemonade  her  lover  has 
prepared  for  her  and  for  himself.  The  drama  closes 
with  the  President  and  his  secretary  being  handed  over 
to  justice  for  earlier  misdeeds.  While  engaged  on  these 
three  dramas  Schiller  was  also  making  a  name  for  himself 
with  other  literary  work  ;  he  had  already  attempted  journal- 
ism in  Stuttgart,  and  in  Mannheim  he  issued  the  first 
number  of  a  new  periodical,  the  Rheinische  Thalia  (1785), 
in  which  the  first  act  of  his  next  drama,  Don  Carlos,  was 
published.  As  a  lyric  poet  he  had  also  contributed  the 
largest  share  to  an  Anthologie  auf  das  Jahr  1782,  which 
he  edited  in  Stuttgart. 

In  April  1785  Schiller  accepted  a  warm  invitation  from 
four  admirers  of  his  genius  in  Leipzig — C.  F.  Korner, 
who  remained  his  life-long  friend,  L.  Huber,  and  two 
sisters,  Dora  and  Minna  Stock,  to  whom  these  young 


158  SCHILLER. 

men  were  engaged — to  pay  them  a  visit.  The  brighter 
epoch  in  the  poet's  life,  which  began  in  Saxony,  finds  its 
echo  in  the  jubilant  strains  of  his  ode  An  die  Freude 
(1785),  the  final  word  in  that  optimistic,  semi-pagan  cult 
of  joy,  which  Hagedorn  had  first  voiced  in  modern  Ger- 
man poetry.  The  summer  months  of  1785  were  spent  in 
Gohlis,  near  Leipzig,  and  from  the  autumn  of  that  year 
until  the  summer  of  1787  Schiller  lived  quietly  as  a  guest 
of  his  friend  Korner  in  Dresden  and  at  Loschwitz  on  the 
Elbe.  The  literary  results  of  these  years  are  all  con- 
tained in  the  Thalia^  which  Schiller  continued  to  edit, 
the  adjective  "  Rheinische  "  in  the  title  being  omitted  as 
the  journal  now  appeared  in  Leipzig.  These  include  two 
novels,  Verbrecher  aus  Infamie  (1787),  a  realistic  robber- 
romance,  and  Der  GeisferseAer(i'jSg),  the  story  of  a  young 
prince  who  is  converted  to  Catholicism  by  trickery ;  but 
the  theme  of  the  latter  is  hardly  worthy  of  the  excellent 
descriptive  writing  it  contains. 

The  principal  harvest  of  these  years  was  Schiller's 
first  tragedy  in  blank  verse,  Don  Carlos^  Infant  wn. 
Spanien,  which,  after  having  appeared  serially  in  his 
journal,  was  revised  and  published  separately  in  1787. 
In  Don  Carlos  Schiller  took  a  step  similar  to  that  which 
Goethe  took  in  his  Egmont ;  he  made  a  complete  break 
with  his  earlier  dramatic  work.  As  first  planned,  Don 
Carlos  was  to  have  been  a  prose  tragedy  not  unsimilar  to 
Kabale  und  Liebe,  the  story  of  an  unhappy  love ; 
gradually,  however,  it  assumed  larger  dimensions  in 
Schiller's  imagination ;  the  intrigue  gave  place  to  a 
political  "  purpose " ;  ,  the  hero  was  more  and  more 
pressed  into  the  background,  and  the  Marquis  Posa,  his 
friend  and  confidant,  became  the  spokesman  of  the  poet's 
own  lofty  dreams  of  a  cosmopolitan  humanism.  The  cul- 
minating scene  in  the  drama  is  the  interview  in  which 
Posa  pleads  for  freedom  of  thought,  with  all  the  arguments 
of  eighteenth-century  rationalism,  at  the  feet  of  Philip  of 
Spain.  Schiller  found  the  plot  of  his  tragedy  in  a  novel 
by  the  French  Abbe  St  Real,  which  had  also  served 
Otway  for  his  tragedy  Don  Carlos.  The  French  princess, 


DON    CARLOS." 


'59 


Elizabeth  of  Anjou,  is  destined  to  be  the  bride  of  Don 
Carlos,  but  on  her  arrival  in  Spain  the  king  resolves 
himself  to  marry  her.  The  main  theme  of  the  drama  is 
the  hopeless  love  of  the  prince  for  his  stepmother.  The 
king  is  led  to  suspect  his  son,  and  this  suspicion  is  corro- 
borated by  the  Princess  Eboli,  a  lady  of  the  court,  who 
is  herself  in  love  with  Carlos.  Carlos's  attempts  to  find 
an  outlet  for  his  energies  in  a  larger  political  life,  although 
supported  by  the  intrigue  of  the  Marquis  Posa,  who 
has  gained  the  confidence  of  the  king,  are  thwarted  ; 
the  Marquis  is  shot,  and  the  prince  handed  over  to  the 
Grand  Inquisitor.  The  plot  of  Don  Carlos  has,  no  doubt, 
suffered  under  the  changes  of  plan,  but  in  these  changes 
lay  its  significance ;  Schiller  here  took  the  step  which 
broke  irrevocably  his  connection  with  the  "  Sturm  und 
TJrang." 

In  December  1784  Schiller  had  had  an  oppor- 
tunity of  reading  the  first  act  of  Don  Carlos  to  the 
Darmstadt  court  on  the  occasion  of  a  visit  of  the  Duke 
of  Weimar,  and  in  1787  he  paid  his  first  visit  to  Weimar. 
This  visit,  however,  was  disappointing,  for  the  Duke 
himself  was  absent,  Goethe  was  in  Italy,  and  he  was 
not  received  with  much  warmth  either  by  the  court  or 
by  Herder  and  Wieland.  Meanwhile  he  continued  those 
studies  in  history  which  he  had  begun  in  connection  with 
Don  Carlos  in  Dresden,  and  in  1788  appeared  the  first 
and  only  volume  of  his  most  ambitious  historical  work, 
Geschichte  des  Abfalls  der  vereinigten  Niederlande ;  this 
was  followed  in  1791-93  by  the  more  popularly  written 
Geschichte  des  dreissigjahrigen  Krieges.  Schiller  ap- 
proaches history,  as  more  or  less  all  the  historians  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  from  the  standpoint  of  the  artist  rather 
than  of  the  scientific  investigator ;  he  selects  the  salient 
features  that  appeal  to  him,  and  distributes  his  light  and 
shade  to  fit  the  hypothesis  from  which  he  sets  out.  To 
him  history  is  rather  a  chain  of  great  biographies  than 
V  methodical  description  of  events ;  but  he  possessed  at 
least  one  great  virtue,  which  is  rare  in  the  scientific  his- 
torian, the  virtue  of  style. 


l6o  SCHILLER. 

His  labours  had  one  important  result ;  on  Goethe's 
recommendation,  Schiller  was  appointed  professor  of  his- 
tory at  the  neighbouring  university  of  Jena  by  the  Duke 
of  Weimar,  and  in  the  following  year,  1789,  he  married 
Charlotte  von  Lengefeld,  whose  acquaintance  he  had 
made  on  the  occasion  of  his  first  visit  to  Thuringia. 
Meanwhile  literature  was  not  altogether  neglected,  and 
in  poems  like  Die  Goiter  Griechenlands  (1788)  and  Die 
Kiinstler  (1789),  he  discovered  a  medium  of  poetic 
expression,  the  philosophic  lyric,  in  which  he  has  no 
rival  in  his  own  literature.  But  before  this  he  had  come 
under  a  new  influence,  which  profoundly  modified  the 
work  of  his  later  life,  that  of  Immanuel  Kant.  From 
history  Schiller  turned  to  philosophy.  The  metaphysical 
side  of  things  always  had  an  attraction  for  his  mind, 
and  in  the  Thalia  he  had  already  published  a  kind 
of  fiction,  in  which  two  friends  exchange  their  views 
on  philosophic  questions.  At  Korner's  instigation  he 
threw  himself  in  1791  into  the  study  of  Kant,  being  par- 
ticularly attracted  by  Kant's  aesthetic  speculations. 

SchillePs  writings  on  aesthetics  may  be  summarised  as 
an  attempt  to  supplement  and  develop  the  ideas  of  his 
master ;  it  is  in  this  light  that  the  essay  Uber  Anmut 
und  Wiirde  (1793)  and  the  Brief e  iiber  die  asthetische 
Erziehung  des  Menschen  (1795)  have  to  be  considered. 
Kant  had  mainly  discussed  the  beautiful  as  a  subjective 
impression  on  the  beholder ;  Schiller  sought  an  absolute 
criterion  of  beauty;  his  aim  was  to  discover  the  quality 
in  an  object  that  led  to  its  being  regarded  as  beautiful. 
And  this  he  believed  he  had  found  in  what  he  called  the 
"  freedom  in  appearance  "  ("  Freiheit  in  der  Erscheinung  ") 
of  the  object.  From  the  beautiful  Schiller  passed  over  to 
the  moral,  and  a'pplied  the  same  method  of  reasoning  to 
ethical  problems.  He  endeavoured  to  bridge  over  those 
breaches  which  Kant  had  made  in  the  utilitarian 
philosophy  of  the  eighteenth  century.  Repelled  by  the 
severe  and  uncompromising  ideals  of  moral  duty  which 
Kant  set  up,  he  demanded  that  our  lives  should  rather 
be  guided  by  the  two  principles  of  "  Anmut "  and 


WRITINGS    ON    AESTHETICS.  l6l 

"  Wiirde,"  of  grace  and  dignity,  and  should  rise  to  a 
higher  harmony,^  which  duty  was  at  one  with  desire.  A 
more  personal  contribution  to  aesthetics  was  his  treatise 
tlber^  naive  und  sentimentalische  Dichtung,  which  appeared 
two^years^'TateE  Nominally  a  dissertation  on  the  funda- 
mental nature  of  poetry  illustrated  by  the  German  literature 
of  the  eighteenth  century,  it  is  in  reality  a  justification  of 
his  own  genius  in  comparison  with  Goethe's.  Schiller 
divides  all  poetic  production  into  two  great  classes : 
primitive  poetry  and  the  highest  manifestations  of  genius 
in  modern  literatures — such  as  Shakespeare  and  Goethe — 
are  "  naive  "  ;  modern  poetry,  on  the  other  hand,  is  almost 
invariably  "  sentimental,"  that  is  to  say,  it  does  not  merely 
give  artistic  form  to  what  it  observes  ;  it  also  reflects, 
muses,  desires.  Schiller  recognised  that  his  own  genius 
was  entirely  "sentimental"  in  its  qualities,  and  his  book 
was  a  personal  plea  for  his  own  right  to  existence  beside 
Goethe.  But  before  Uber  naive  imd  sentimentalische 
Dichtung  was  published,  Schiller  had  become  the  friend 
of  Goethe,  to  the  second  phase  in  whose  career  we  have 
now  to  turn. 

Goethe  arrived  in  Weimar  from  Frankfort  in  the  end 
of  1775.  The  favourable  opinion  which  the  young  Duke 
of  Weimar  had  already  formed  of  him  increased  on  nearer 
acquaintance ;  he  believed  that  the  poet  would  not  only 
be  an  ornament  to  his  duchy,  but  could  be  made  a  valu- 
able servant  of  the  state.  Goethe  threw  himself  with 
ardour  into  the  new  life ;  and  he  who,  only  a  year  before, 
had  been  overflowing  with  poetic  ideas  and  great  literary 
schemes,  seemed  for  a  time  to  forget  literature  altogether. 
As  he  gradually  found  his  feet  again,  the  inevitable  love- 
affair  kept  him  from  being  too  much  engrossed  by  the 
routine  of  official  duties.  Goethe's  new  love,  Charlotte  von 
Stein,  who  was  some  years  his  senior  and  the  mother  of 
several  children,  has  been  called  the  noblest  woman  that 
he  ever  loved  ;  and  his  affection  for  her  resembled  a  warm 
intellectual  friendship  rather  than  a  passion.  And  now, 
for  nearly  ten  years,  happy  years,  full  of  a  varied  activity, 
political,  scientific,  and  literary,  Goethe  published  no  work 


162       GOETHE'S  FIRST  PERIOD  IN  WEIMAR. 

of  the  first  rank  ;  at  most  he  produced  a  handful  of  perfect 
lyric  poems  (An  den  Mond,  Wonne  der  Wehmut,  Wanderers 
Nachtlied,  Ilmenau),  a  "  Singspiel,"  Jery  und  Bdtely 
(1780),  and  a  delicate  little  one-act  play,  Die  Geschwister 
(1787),  depicting  the  development  of  sisterly  love  into  a 
warmer  affection.  But  these  seem  only  a  poor  harvest 
compared  with  the  feverish  activity  of  his  last  year  in 
Frankfort. 

Then  came,  however,  the  great  crisis  in  the  poet's  life. 
In  October  1786  he  set  out  for  Italy,  not  returning  to 
^Weimar  until  the  summer  of  1788.  What  Italy  meant 
for  Goethe  it  is  impossible  to  exaggerate ;  far  away  from 
the  distractions  of  Weimar  life,  and  the  petty  interests  of 
the  court,  Goethe  was  able  to  pass  his  life  calmly  in 
review ;  for  the  first  time  he  seemed,  as  it  were,  to  -get 
outside  himself  and  see  himself  objectively.  Art,  before 
which  he  had  stood  for  so  many  years,  as  before  a  sphinx, 
now  revealed  its  inmost  secrets  to  him  ;  he  realised  at  last 
what  art  meant  in  the  march  of  eighteenth  century  human- 
ism, saw  that  it  was  something  calmer  and  more  universal 
than  it  had  appeared  amidst  the  passionate  enthusiasm  of 
his  youth  for  a  Shakespearean  tragedy,  a  Gothic  cathedral, 
or  a  Volkslied  ;  he  felt  that  he  himself  was  the  born 
artist,  the  bearer  of  the  mission  that  had  revealed  itself 
to  him,  and  under  the  Italian  sun  he  resolved  to  devote 
himself  henceforth  solely  to  its  service.  Thus  Italy  gave 
him  the  stimulus  he  needed  to  finish  his  many  plans  and 
fragments.  The  edition  of  his  Schriften,  which  began  to 
appear  in  1787,  included  a  large  number  of  new  works. 
He  put  the  finishing  touches  to  Iphigenie  auf  Tauris 
(1787)  and  Egmont  (1788),  and  all  but  finished  Torquato 
Tasso  (1790);  plans  were  laid  for  new  classical  dramas, 
a  Nausikaa,  an  Iphigenie  auf  Delphos  ;  some  at  least  of 
the  beautiful  Romische  Elegien  were  written  in  Rome ; 
while  amidst  foreign  surroundings  he  revised  his  most 
German  work,  Faust,  which  was  published  in  its  first 
fragmentary  form  in  1790. 

The  significance  of  Italy  to  Goethe  is  to  be  read 
out  of  the  two  dramatic  poems.  Iphigenie  auf  Tauris 


"  IPHIGENIE    AUF   TAURIS."  163 

and  Torquato  Tasso.  As  a  poet,  he  has  written  deeper 
works  than  either,  works  fraught  with  greater  meaning, 
but  he  has  written  nothing  superior  to  them  in  artistic 
form  and  classic,  harmonious  beauty ;  here  we  find  what 
is  rare  in  German  poetry,  perfect  thought  wedded  to 
perfect  form.  Iphigenie  auf  Tauris  is  an  adaptation  of 
the  tragedy  of  Euripides  to  modern  ideals  and  modern 
needs ;  here,  as  in  the  ancient  tragedy,  Iphigenie,  the 
Greek  priestess,  is  an  exile  in  the  land  of  the  barbarian 
Scythians,  and  has  already  begun  to  shed  her  mild  and 
civilising  influence  on  the  rude  people.  The  Scythian 
king,  Thoas,  demands  her  hand  in  marriage,  and  persists 
in  his  demand  even  after  she  reveals  to  him  that  she  is 
of  the  race  of  Tantalus,  so  hated  by  the  gods.  Mean- 
while, two  strangers  have  arrived  at  Tauris,  and  these  the 
disappointed  king  commands  shall  be  sacrificed  according 
to  the  inhuman  rites  which  for  a  time  Iphigenie  has 
succeeded  in  holding  in  abeyance.  Iphigenie  learns  that 
one  of  these  strangers  is  her  own  brother  Orestes,  who, 
tortured  by  the  furies,  seeks,  as  the  only  relief  held  out 
to  him  by  the  oracle,  the  temple  of  his  sister,  where  he 
must  obtain  the  statue  of  the  goddess.  The  climax  of 
the  tragedy  is,  as  in  Euripides,  the  freeing  of  Orestes  from 
the  avenging  fates  ;  but  while  to  the  Greek  poet  this  is 
a  purely  outward  incident,  the  furies  relaxing  their  hold 
upon  their  victim,  in  Goethe's  play  we  have  only  the 
psychological  process  which  Euripides  visualised.  Orestes 
confesses  to  Iphigenie  that  the  blood  of  his  murdered 
mother  is  on  his  head  ;  this  confession  to  his  sister,  who 
stands  before  him  as  the  inspired  handmaid  of  Artemis 
and  the  saviour  of  her  race,  frees  him  from  the  remorse 
that  haunts  his  steps.  In  one  other  important  point  the 
modern  poet  departs  from  his  Greek  model.  Truer  to 
actuality,  Euripides  shows,  in  the  theft  of  the  goddess's 
image,  the  cunning  of  the  Greek  mind  triumphing  over 
the  heavy-witted  barbarian  ;  Goethe,  on  the  other  hand, 
makes  his  Thoas  a  humane  tyrant  of  the  eighteenth 
century ;  and  once  more,  at  the  close,  Iphigenie  over- 
comes his  hostility  to  the  Greeks  by  the  frankness  of  her 


164       GOETHE'S  FIRST  PERIOD  IN  WEIMAR. 

confession,  and  wins  him  as  a  friend.  The  drama 
closes  with  the  Greeks  departing  in  peace ;  no  "  goddess 
from  a  machine,"  as  in  Euripides,  is  needed  to  cut  the 
knot,  no  caprice  of  a  higher  power  to  overrule  the  course 
of  nature. 

More  subjective  and  dramatically  less  satisfying  is  Tor- 
quato  Tasso.  Indeed,  Tasso  belongs,  properly  speaking,  to 
that  category  of  Goethe's  dramas  which  have  been  grouped 
together  as  "confessions."  The  court  of  Alphonso  of 
Ferrara  is  obviously  that  of  Weimar;  the  figures  of  the 
drama  have  all  more  or  less  their  German  counterparts, 
and  Tasso,  the  over-sensitive  poet,  whose  tragedy  springs 
from  his  own  lack  of  worldliness  and  self-control,  is  Goethe 
himself.  But  such  resemblances  are  shadowy  and  distant, 
and  very  different  from  the  direct  portraiture  which  Goethe 
permitted  himself  in  his  earlier,  realistic  period.  Tasso  at 
the  beginning  of  the  play  has  just  completed  his  epic,  La 
Gerusalemme  liberata,  and  brings  it  to  his  duke ;  he  is 
rewarded  by  a  laurel  wreath  which  the  duke's  sister,  the 
Princess  Leonore  von  Este,  places  upon  his  brow.  The 
Secretary  of  State.  Antonio  Montecatino,  views  with  dis- 
favour this  flattery  of  the  poet,  and  expresses  himself  in 
a  way  that  is  calculated  to  offend  Tasso's  self-esteem. 
The  ill-feeling  between  the  two  men  increases,  until  in  a 
moment  of  forgetfulness  Tasso  draws  his  sword  upon  the 
minister.  The  poet  is  placed  under  arrest,  and  when  set 
free  resolves  to  leave  the  court ;  but  before  he  goes,  he 
confesses  to  the  princess  his  love  for  her.  This  foolish 
step  makes  him  impossible  at  court,  and  he  turns  at  last 
to  Antonio  to  find  in  him  his  best-meaning  friend.  Tasso 
is  a  play  of  many  flaws  :  it  offends  against  the  chief 
canons  of  dramatic  construction  ;  the  characters  are  con- 
ceived only,  as  it  were,  from  the  inside,  not  dramatically  and 
in  their  totality  :  and  the  course  of  events  is  too  shadowily 
indicated,  too  uninteresting,  to  hold  the  attention  of  an 
ordinary  theatre-audience.  But  as  poetry  Tasso  is  one  of 
the  most  concentrated  and  wonderful  of  all  Goethe's  crea- 
tions ;  in  no  other  work  has  he  laid  bare  so  unreservedly 
the  inner  workings  of  the  supersensitive  poetic  tempera- 


"TASSO"    AND    "  EGMONT."  165 

ment ;  it  is  the  tragedy — for  tragedy  it  is,  in  spite  of  its 
inconclusive  ending — of  genius. 

Still  another  of  Goethe's  greater  dramas  was  completed 
and  published  in  the  edition  of  his  Schriften  of  1787-90, 
Egmont.      In   plan   Egmont    belongs   to   a    much   earlier 
period  of  the  poet's  life ;  for  it  was  sketched  out  in  a  form 
as  irregular  as  that  of  Gotz  von  Berlichingen  before  Goethe 
left  Frankfort  for  Weimar.     Egmont  is  a   more   popular 
drama    on    the    stage    than    Tasso,    but    it    is    even    less 
dramatic    in    the    true   sense  of  that  word ;    Tasso  is  at 
least   psychologically   dramatic,    but   Egmont   has    hardly 
even  this  surrogate  for  outward  and  visible  conflicts.     It 
is  a  collection  of  dramatic  episodes,  centring  in  a  great 
personality  ;   Graf  Egmont,  the  leader   of  the   Dutch   in 
their  revolt  against  Philip  II.  of  Spain,  remains  in  Brussels 
in   spite  of  the  warnings   he  receives   that   his  life  is  in 
danger;  he  prefers  the  love  of  his  Klarchen  to  his  own 
safety;  the  consequence  is  that  the  Duke  of  Alba  has  him 
arrested  and  executed.    These  are  the  facts  of  the  play  ;  and 
round  these  facts  Goethe  has  grouped  a  series  of  dramatic 
genre-pictures,  which  serve  to  throw  light  upon  the  hero's 
fate.     Above  all,  Egmont  himself  is  a  supremely  interest- 
ing personality ;    he  is    Gotz  over   again,    but   a   happier 
Gotz,  who  has  left  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang  "  of  life  behind 
him  and  sees  the  world  with  more  optimistic  eyes  ;  he  suc- 
cumbs, not  in  tragic  battle  with  an  adverse  fate,  but  merely 
because  his  own  great  heart  has  trusted  his  fellowmen  too 
much.     Gotz  died  with  the  word  "  freedom  "  on  his  lips, 
a  freedom  for  which  he  had  fought  in  vain  ;  to  Egmont 
appears    the    goddess   of  freedom    in    the    semblance   of 
Klarchen  and  promises  him  triumphs  in  the  world  to  come. 
Egmont  may  be  only  an  indifferent  drama,  but  Goethe  has 
invested  his  Egmont  and  Klarchen — the  latter  one  of  the 
most  delicately  drawn  of  all  Goethe's  women— with  a  charm 
that  they  can  never  lose. 


i66 


CHAPTER    XVI. 

THE    CULMINATION    OF    WEIMAR    CLASSICISM. 

ON  June  18,  1788,  Goethe  returned  to  Weimar  from  his 
Italian  journey.  The  realities  which  confronted  him  here 
did  not,  however,  at  all  fit  into  that  ideal  scheme  of  life 
and  work  which  he  had  mapped  out  for  himself  in  Italy; 
after  the  serenity  and  beauty  of  Italian  landscape  and 
antique  art,  he  could  not  feel  at  home  under  northern 
skies ;  he  was  repelled  by  the  turbulent,  unbalanced  litera- 
ture of  the  later  "Sturm  und  Drang."  He  withdrew  into 
himself  and  took  but  little  interest  in  poetry  and  art 
until  his  friendship  with  Schiller,  which  began  in  1794, 
led  him  back  again  to  these  things.  In  minor  prose- 
writings  of  this  period,  such  as  the  Unterhaltungen 
deutscher  Ausgewanderten  (1795),  and  dramas  like  Der 
Grosscophta  (1791)  and  Der  Burger  general  (1793),  we 
see,  too,  how  little  Goethe  was  in  sympathy  with  the 
political  movement,  or  understood  the  terrible  lesson 
of  the  French  Revolution.  In  1794  he  published  his 
admirable  modernisation  of  the  Low  German  epic  Reineke 
Fucks,  and  in  1795  an^  1796  the  Romische  Elegien  and 
the  VenetianischeEpigramme.  But  the  first  great  work  of 
this  new  period  of  Goethe's  life  was  the  novel,  Wilhelm 
Meisters  Lehrjahre,  which  appeared  in  the  course  of  the 
"years  1795  and  1796. 

The  plan  of  the  novel  had  been  considerably  widened 
since  Goethe  first  wrote  it  as  a  story  of  theatrical  life 
( Wilhelm  Meisters  theatralische  Sendung)  in  1777;  the 
theatre  is  now  but  an  episode,  although  an  important 


"WILHELM    MEISTERS    LEHRJAHRE."  167 

one,  in  the  educational  process  whereby  a  young  man 
completes  his  apprenticeship  to  life.  As  in  so  many 
of  his  other  works,  Goethe  has  woven  into  his  fiction 
the  inevitable  "  confession " ;  for  he,  too,  like  Meister, 
had  had  his  imagination  nourished  on  poetry  and  a 
marionette-theatre;  he,  too,  had  come  into  conflict  with 
the  prosaic  demands  of  a  vocation  in  which  his  heart 
did  not  lie.  But  just  as  in  Werther  Goethe  had  carried  to 
a  ruthless  logical  conclusion  a  motive  which  had  its  origin 
in  his  own  experience,  so  in  this  novel  Meister  becomes 
for  a  time  wha't  Goethe  himself  never  was,  the  slave  of  his 
love  for  the  theatre.  Meister  abandons  his  father's  count- 
ing-house and  joins  a  troupe  of  travelling  players,  ultimately 
becoming  their  leader.  Romantic  episodes  are  introduced 
into  the  story  ;  mysterious  figures,  like  the  Harper  and 
Mignon  —  the  latter,  perhaps,  the  most  ethereal  of  all 
Goethe's  creations  —  wind  themselves  round  Meister's 
heart  and  influence  his  life ;  above  all  things,  his  chosen 
vocation  brings  him  into  touch  with  Shakespeare,  whose 
Hamlet  the  company  plays,  giving  Goethe  an  opportunity 
for  reflections  upon  that  work  which  have  influenced  all 
subsequent  Shakespeare  criticism.  Gradually  Meister  dis- 
covers that  the  stage  is  not  the  goal  of  his  life,  but  only 
an  episode  in  his  "  apprenticeship " ;  he  rises  to  new 
responsibilities  and  more  serious  aims.  The  pretty 
actress,  Marianne,  who  had  captivated  his  youth,  gives 
place  to  Nathalie,  the  noble  sister  of  Lothario ;  and 
she,  in  spite  of  other  passing  fancies  on  Wilhelm's 
part,  at  last  completely  retains  his  affections.  The 
Harper  is  discovered  to  be  the  father  of  Mignon,  the 
Romantic  child  with  the  instinctive,  insatiable  love  of 
Italy ;  and  with  Mignon's  death  the  novel  closes.  Wil- 
helm  Meister's  apprenticeship  to  life  is  at  an  end ;  he 
has  passed,  as  Schiller  said,  "  from  a  void,  indefinite  ideal 
to  a  definite  active  life,  but  without  losing  his  idealising 
power  "  ;  he  has  realised  the  "  holy  earnestness  "  of  life. 

Wilhelm  Meisters  Lehrjahre  occupies  a  central  position 
in  the  history  of  German  fiction  ;  it  is  the  culmination  of 
the  eighteenth-century  type  of  romance  which,  beginning 


l68      THE    CULMINATION    OF    WEIMAR    CLASSICISM. 

with  imitations  of  Richardson  and  Fielding,  passed  to 
Wieland's  Agathon  and  Moritz's  Anton  Reiser ;  and  as 
the  accepted  model  for  the  novel  of  the  young  Ro- 
manticists, it  dominated  German  prose  literature  down 
to  the  rise  of  the  social  novel  towards  the  middle 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  Many  years  later  Goethe 
provided  his  novel  with  the  sequel  which  the  original 
title  promised,  Wilhelm  Meisters  Wanderjahre  (1821-29)  ; 
but  this  is  a  book  of  an  entirely  different  kind,  and  can 
hardly  even  be  called  a  continuation.  To  have  finished 
Wilhelm  Meister  in  the  spirit  of  the  first  part  —  and 
Goethe,  we  know,  had  the  intention  of  showing  in  what 
relations  his  hero  was  to  stand  to  social  problems,  after 
he  had  completed  his  apprenticeship  —  was  no  longer 
possible  a  quarter  of  a  'century  later.  Between  the  two 
books  lay  not  merely  the  French  Revolution,  but  the 
rise  and  fall  of  Napoleon  ;  the  word  society  connoted 
two  entirely  different  things  in  1795  and  1820,  and 
Goethe  no  doubt  felt  that  his  hero,  to  fit  himself  for 
this  new  society,  would  have  had  to  pass  through  another 
apprenticeship.  The  Wanderjahre,  which  is  eked  out  by 
a  number  of  short  stories,  written  at  widely  different 
times,  contains  Goethe's  most  explicit  views  on  political 
and  religious  questions ;  and  this,  if  not  its  quality  as  a 
novel,  gives  it  an  important  place  among  the  writings  of 
his  later  years. 

In  the  summer  of  1794  Goethe  and  Schiller  exchanged 
the  first  letters  of  that  correspondence  which  forms  one 
of  the  most  precious  documents  of  Weimar  classicism. 
The  immediate  occasion  was  a  new  periodical,  Die  Horen, 
in  which  Schiller  was  anxious  to  obtain  Goethe's  col- 
laboration. Die  Horen  was  no  more  successful  than 
Schiller's  previous  journalistic  ventures,  but  it  accelerated 
the  growing  friendship  :  the  very  antagonism  of  the  out- 
side world  to  the  journal  helped  to  bring  the  two  poets 
closer  together;  and  in  1795  tne>'  resolved  to  retaliate 
on  their  critics.  They  published  together,  not  in  the 
Horen,  but  in  Schiller's  Musenalmanach  fiir  1796,  a 
collection  of  distichs  in  the  manner  of  Martial,  to  which 


"  HERMANN  UND  DOROTHEA."        l6g 

they  gave  the  title  Xenien,  the  Greek  word  "xenion" 
meaning  a  gift  offered  to  a  guest.  These  "gifts"  seem 
to  have  fully  achieved  their  object,  although  to  a  modern 
reader  it  is  often  not  easy  to  understand  where  their  sting 
lay;  the  critics  of  the  Weimar  poets  were,  however, 
silenced,  and  the  way  made  clear  for  positive  achieve- 
ments. Schiller  completed  his  Wallenstein,  and  Goethe 
one  of  his  most  perfect  poems,  Hermann  und  Dorothea. 

In  Hermann  und  Dorothea  (1798)  Goethe  stands  in 
the  debt  of  one  of  the  leading  poets  of  the  Gottingen 
school,  J.  H.  Voss.  That  poet's  adaptation  of  the  primi- 
tive Homeric  spirit  to  German  conditions  in  his  idyll, 
Luise,  suggested  Goethe's  poem.  Hermann  und  Doro- 
thea is,  however,  no  more  to  be  described  as  an  epic  than 
its  model ;  it  is  a  "  Novelle  "  or  "  short  story  "  in  hexa- 
meters. It  tells  how  Hermann,  son  of  the  landlord  of 
the  "  Golden  Lion "  in  a  village  near  the  Rhine,  finds 
his  bride  among  a  company  of  emigrants,  who  are  flee- 
ing from  the  terrors  of  the  French  Revolution.  Goethe 
delights  in  describing  in  Voss's  manner  the  daily  routine 
of  the  village,  the  little  trivial  happenings  that  make  up 
the  villagers'  life ;  and  he  draws  with  a  perfect  sure- 
ness  of  touch  the  village  magnates,  the  innkeeper,  the 
pastor,  and  the  apothecary.  The  story  is  simple,  even 
conventional,  and  is  constructed  a  little  artificially  out  of 
misunderstandings  and  surprises.  But  this  very  touch  of 
artificiality  is  quite  in  keeping  with  the  poetic  style  ;  for 
above  all  things,  Hermann  und  Dorothea  possesses  style, 
not  perhaps  a  Homeric  style,  but  one  at  least  more  deli- 
cate and  polished  than  was  consistent  with  the  turbid 
naturalism  of  Luise.  Her)nann  und  Dorothea  might  be 
described  as  Goethe's  most  "classic"  poem  ;  it  is  written 
with  an  objectivity  which  he  had  not  yet  attained  in 
Iphigenie  and  Tasso,  and  its  characters,  stripped  of  the 
individual  and  the  personal,  have  become  the  generalised 
ideals  demanded  by  the  classic  theory  which  Goethe  dis- 
cussed with  Schiller  in  these  years.  After  the  success  of 
Hermann  und  Dorothea,  Goethe  attempted  to  approxi- 
mate still  more  closely  to  the  Homeric  model  by  choosing 


170      THE    CULMINATION    OF    WEIMAR    CLASSICISM. 

themes  such  as  the  story  of  the  Swiss  hero  Tell,  and 
even  of  the  Greek  Achilles  himself,  which  seemed  to  him 
adapted  to  a  genuine  epic  treatment.  But  his  Achilleis 
did  not  get  beyond  the  second  canto,  and  the  materials 
he  had  collected  for  Tell  were  subsequently  handed  over 
to  Schiller  for  his  drama  on  that  subject. 

Meanwhile  Schiller's  Musenalmanach,  which  continued 
to  appear  annually  from  1 796  to  1800  with  more  encourag- 
ing success  than  had  attended  any  other  of  his  periodicals, 
brought  a  new  stimulus  to  bear  on  the  lyric  genius  of 
both  himself  and  Goethe.  In  the  ballad  Schiller  dis- 
covered an  opportunity  for  his  genius,  hardly  inferior  to 
the  philosophic  lyric,  and  from  1796  he  enriched  his 
literature  with  a  series  of  masterly  ballads — Der  Taucher, 
Der  Handschuh,  Der  Kampf  mit  dem  Drachen,  Der  Ring 
des  Polykrates,  Die  Kraniche  des  Ibykus,  to  mention  only  a 
few  of  the  best  known — which  combine  a  keen  sense  for 
the  dramatic  and  the  picturesque  with  an  almost  Greek 
sensitiveness  to  form  and  style.  In  1799  Schiller  put  the 
crown  to  his  ballad-poetry  with  the  magnificent  Lied  von 
der  Glocke,  a  kind  of  poetic  epitome  of  human  life,  in 
which,  one  might  say,  the  two  strains  in  the  poet's  lyric 
gift,  the  philosophic  and  the  dramatic,  meet  and  blend. 
And  in  friendly  rivalry  with  Schiller  Goethe  wrote  in  1797 
ballads  like  Der  Zauberlehrling,  Der  Gott  und  die  baya- 
dere, Die  Braut  von  Korinth,  and,  as  a  return  to  the 
Volkslied-like  simplicity  of  his  early  lyrics,  the  cycle  of 
Die  schone  Mullerin — all  poetry,  which  take  an  equally 
high  place  in  the  literature  of  German  classicism. 

Goethe's  uncompromising  classical  theories  in  the  years 
that  followed  Hermann  und  Dorothea  detracted  seriously, 
however,  from  the  value  of  his  dramatic  work.  His 
prologues  and  "  Festspiele "  for  the  Weimar  theatre,  his 
translations  of  tragedies  by  Voltaire,  above  all,  his  own 
severely  classic  dramas,  Die  natiirliche  Tochter  (1804)  and 
Pandora  (1810),  were  of  no  significance  for  the  future  of 
the  national  drama.  Die  natiirliche  Tochter  is  nobly  planned 
as  the  first  of  a  trilogy  in  which  Goethe  hoped  to  embody 
his  own  conception  of  the  French  Revolution  ;  but  the 


GOETHE'S  CLASSIC  THEORIES.  171 

impersonal  objectivity  is  carried  to  such  lengths  that  the 
figures  of  the  drama  seem  only  pale  shadows  or  statuesque 
abstractions  to  us.  There  is  poetry  both  in  Die  natiirliche 
Tochler  and  in  the  still  more  forbiddingly  classic  allegory 
of  Pandora,  but  it  is  a  poetry  that  appeals  to  the  intellect, 
not  the  emotions.  The  classic  doctrines  obsessed  at  this 
time  Goethe's  whole  intellectual  life ;  his  views  on  litera- 
ture, his  criticism  of  art,  as  is  to  be  seen  in  his  book  on 
Winkelmann  und  seine  Zeit  (1805),  in  his  art  periodical, 
Die  Propylden  (1798-1800),  and  in  the  principles  on 
which  he  directed  the  Weimar  theatre  from  i  791  to  1817, 
were  uncompromisingly  classic,  and  in  marked  contrast  to 
the  vigorous  national  spirit  in  German  art  and  poetry, 
which  the  Romantic  School  had  called  into  life.  In 
1808,  however,  appeared  a  work  before  which  all  Goethe's 
classical  aberrations  sink  into  insignificance,  the  national 
drama  of  the  German  people,  the  First  Part  of  Faust. 
But,  as  the  crowning  work  of  the  poet's  life,  Faust  will 
be  dealt  with  in  the  following  chapter. 

With  his  trilogy  of  Wallenstein  Schiller  opened  the 
series  of  his  dramatic  masterpieces.  Like  Don  Carlos, 
Wallenstein  had  been  long  in  the  poet's  workshop,  but  it 
had  benefited  by  the  delay.  To  the  conscientious  study 
of  history  which  had  preceded  it,  is  due  the  fact  that 
Wallenstein  gradually  emerged  from  a  drama  in  the  style 
of  Don  Carlos,  to  become  a  spacious  historical  trilogy, 
the  ripest  historical  drama,  as  it  was  virtually  the  last,  of 
the  eighteenth  century.  Another  influence  is  to  be  seen 
at  work  in  Wallenstein  which  was  hitherto  absent  from 
Schiller's  dramatic  work,  the  influence  of  Greek  tragedy  ; 
Wallenstein  himself  is  a  tragic  figure,  less  in  the  manner 
of  Shakespeare  than  of  Sophocles,  and  the  drama  is,  in 
Greek  fashion,  the  history  of  a  catastrophe  foreordained 
by  fate,  the  struggle  of  a  great  soul  against  powers 
that  are  too  strong  for  it.  Only  at  a  late  period  in  the 
composition  of  the  tragedy  did  Schiller  resolve  to  divide 
it  into  three  parts  ;  it  is  virtually  only  one  long  tragedy 
in  ten  acts,  preceded  by  a  prologue.  This  prologue, 
entitled  Wallensteins  Lager  (1798),  displays  vividly  and 


172       THE    CULMINATION    OF    WEIMAR    CLASSICISM. 

picturesquely  the  motley  elements  that  made  up  Wal- 
lenstein's  camp  as  it  lay  before  Pilsen  in  the  winter  of 
1633-34;  it  provided  a  background  for  the  whole  drama, 
and  obviated  the  necessity  of  breaking  the  classic  unity  of 
style  by  the  introduction  of  mitieu-scenes  into  the  body 
of  the  tragedy.  When  the  first  drama,  Die  Piccolomini 
(1799),  opens,  Wallenstein,  in  whose  character  the  domin- 
ant forces  are  overweening  ambition  and  a  superstitious 
faith  in  his  lucky  star,  is  within  easy  distance  of  his  goal, 
which  is  to  see  himself  crowned  king  of  Bohemia.  His 
strength  lies  in  the  army  he  has  himself  created,  and  to 
turn  the  balance  of  power  in  his  favour  he  is  about  to 
enter  into  a  secret  alliance  with  the  Protestant  Swedes. 
Only  his  blind  faith  in  the  stars  holds  him  back  until  the 
propitious  moment  arrives.  Meanwhile,  however,  in  order 
to  accelerate  matters,  Wallenstein's  two  staunchest  friends, 
Field-Marshal  Illo  and  Graf  Terzky,  take  the  opportunity 
of  a  banquet  at  which  the  leaders  of  the  various  regiments 
are  all  more  or  less  intoxicated,  to  obtain  the  signatures 
of  these  men  to  a  document  declaring  their  inalienable 
allegiance  to  Wallenstein  whatever  may  befall.  One  of 
them,  however,  an  Italian,  Octavio  Piccolomini,  whom 
Wallenstein  trusts  most,  sees  through  the  premeditated 
treason ;  but  he  abides  his  time.  He  warns  his  son 
Max,  but  Max  Piccolomini  refuses  to  listen  to  his  father, 
for  he  loves  Wallenstein's  daughter  Thekla  and  looks  up 
to  Wallenstein  himself  in  blind  hero-worship. 

Die  Piccolomini  is  merely  a  preparation  for  the  real 
tragedy,  Wallensteins  Tod  (1799).  Wallenstein's  fate  is 
sealed  ;  like  another  CEdipus  he  is  fighting  against  powers 
that  the  spectator  knows  will  be  too  strong  for  him.  His 
plot  to  join  the  Swedes  has  been  discovered  ;  action  is 
imperative,  and  he  openly  throws  in  his  lot  with  the  enemy. 
With  tragic  blindness  he  places  all  responsibility  at  the 
critical  moment  in  the  hands  of  Octavio  Piccolomini  ; 
but  the  regiments  upon  which  he  relies  break  away  from 
him  and  he  stands  alone,  deserted  at  last  even  by  Max 
Piccolomini.  With  the  friends  he  still  believes  faithful 
to  him  he  escapes  to  Eger,  and  is  here  assassinated  by 


"  WALLENSTEIN  "    AND    "MARIA    STUART."       173 

one  of  them.  The  crowning  touch  of  tragic  irony  is 
given  to  the  drama  by  the  arrival  of  a  messenger  from 
the  Emperor,  conferring  on  Octavio  the  title  of  "  Prince." 
No  less  classic  in  its  adherence  to  the  methods  of 
Greek  tragedy  is  Schiller's  next  tragedy,  Maria  Stuart 
(1800).  This  drama  contains  less  outward  incident  than 
Wallenstein,  and  it  has,  properly  speaking,  hardly  any- 
tragic  conflict  at  all.  The  scene  is  at  Fotheringay  Castle 
on  the  last  days  of  Mary  Stuart's  life ;  she  is  already  con- 
demned to  die  before  the  curtain  rises,  and  the  episode 
which  fill  out  the  play — the  attempt  of  the  young  catholic 
convert  Mortimer,  who  is  in  love  with  her,  to  effect  her 
escape,  Leicester's  vacillating  sympathy  for  her,  even 
the  culminating  scene,  in  the  garden  of  Fotheringay,  in 
which  she  seals  her  own  fate  by  her  angry  remonstrances 
with  Elizabeth, — all  these  are  but  semblances  of  a  drama- 
tic conflict  where  none  exists.  But,  on  the  other  hand, 
Schiller  has  embodied  in  this  tragedy  an  idea  that  was 
deeply  rooted  in  the  ethics  of  the  German  classical  age — 
namely,  that  of  moral  regeneration  and  purification  through 
suffering.  This  is  the  significance  of  the  long  and  harrow- 
ing fifth  act,  in  which  Mary  is  lifted  up  by  her  religion  to 
a  peace  of  soul  she  has  not  known  before  ;  the  expia- 
tion on  the  scaffold  becomes  for  her  a  triumph  of  her 
better  self.  This  spiritualising  of  the  final  conflict  in  the 
heroine  herself  atones  in  very  great  measure  for  the 
absence,  to  which  English  readers  are  naturally  more  sensi- 
tive than  German,  of  an  adequate  historical  background. 

A  similar  ethical  idea  lies  behind  Schiller's  tragedy,  Die 
Jung/ran  von  Orleans  (1801),  for  which  he  borrowed  the 
paraphernalia  and  colouring  of  the  Romantic  drama.  For 
his  purpose  in  this  play  the  poet  was  compelled  to  depart 
even  further  from  history  than  in  his  previous  dramas  ; 
his  Joan  of  Arc  is  a  wholly  idealised  figure.  The  Divine 
command  to  Joan  to  lead  her  army  against  the  English 
and  crown  her  king  in  Rheims  is  coupled  with  the  condition 
that  success  depends  on  her  resistance  of  all  earthly  love  : 
and  in  place  of  the  historical  tradition,  according  to  which 
Joan  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  English  and  was  burned  by 


174      THE    CULMINATION    OF    WEIMAR    CLASSICISM. 

them  as  a  witch,  Schiller  makes  his  heroine  break  her 
vow.  Offers  of  marriage  made  to  her  by  the  French  com- 
manders, Dunois  and  Lahire,  she  rejects  at  once,  but 
in  single  combat  with  Lionel,  a  young  English  soldier, 
her  heart  softens,  and  she  grants  him  his  life.  She  feels 
that  by  this  weakness  she  has  frustrated  her  holy  mission, 
and  mutely  accedes  to  the  accusation  of  witchcraft  which 
her  father  brings  against  her.  Her  only  desire  now  is  to 
atone  for  her  guilt  by  a  heroic  death.  She  falls  into  the 
enemy's  hands  ;  Lionel  protects  her  and  throws  himself  at 
her  feet ;  but  her  moral  regeneration  is  complete ;  she 
is  proof  against  his  love,  breaks  her  chains  and  once  more 
leads  her  people  to  victory.  Like  Maria  Stuart,  she,  too, 
dies  triumphant.  Although  in  its  ideas,  its  personages, 
and  in  its  employment  of  the  unnatural  and  the  super- 
natural, Die  Jungfrau  von  Orleans  is  far  removed  from 
our  modern  sympathies,  we  are  bound  to  recognise  that 
Schiller,  having  resolved  to  write  a  "  Romantic  "  tragedy, 
has  consistently  carried  out  his  plan  ;  in  a  higher  degree 
perhaps  than  any  other  of  Schiller's  dramas,  Die  Jungfrau 
•von  Orleans  possesses  the  quality  of  harmonious  style. 

Outwardly  a  great  step  in  the  direction  of  render- 
ing German  tragedy  classic,  although  in  reality  only  a 
further  concession  to  the  pessimistic  quietism  of  Roman- 
ticism, is  Schiller's  next  tragedy,  Die  Braut  von  Messina 
(1803).  This  drama  is  an  obvious  experiment,  an  attempt 
to  adapt  the  technique  of  the  Greek  tragedy  to  the  modern 
stage ;  like  a  Greek  tragedy,  Die  Braut  von  Messina  is 
not  divided  into  acts,  and  the  action  is  helped  out  by 
means  of  a  chorus,  the  introduction  of  which  Schiller 
defended  in  a  preface  to  the  play.  The  scene  is  Messina, 
the  time  the  Middle  Ages.  Dreams  are  the  starting- 
points  of  the  action.  The  Prince  of  Messina  sees  one 
night  a  lily  growing  up  between  two  laurel  trees,  when 
suddenly  the  lily  turns  to  fire  and  destroys  everything 
around  it.  A  wise  Arabian  interprets  this  dream  as 
meaning  that  a  daughter  will  be  born  to  him  and  will 
cause  the  death  of  his  two  sons,  Caesar  and  Manuel ; 
and  he  orders  the  daughter  who  is  subsequently  born 


"DIE  BRAUT  VON  MESSINA"  AND  "TELL."     175 

to  be  drowned.  His  wife,  Isabella,  however,  also  trusting 
to  a  dream,  which  is  interpreted  as  meaning  that  her 
daughter  will  unite  in  love  the  hostile  temperaments 
of  the  two  brothers,  saves  the  child's  life  and  has  it 
brought  up  secretly  in  a  monastery.  Both  dreams,  like 
the  oracles  of  Greek  tragedy,  come  true  ;  the  brothers  in 
turn  see  their  unknown  sister  and  love  her.  In  blind 
jealousy  Caesar  kills  Manuel  and,  when  he  learns  that 
Beatrice  is  his  own  sister,  kills  himself.  In  devising 
this  plot  Schiller's  aim  was  to  adapt  to  modern,  or  at 
least  mediaeval  conditions,  the  dominant  motive  of 
Greek  tragedy ;  but  in  the  transference  the  motive 
lost  its  dignity.  For  the  oracle  was  an  integral  part 
of  the  Greek  religion,  whereas  the  dreams  of  the  Braut 
von  Messina  appear  to  the  modern  mind,  intolerant  of 
superstition,  as,  at  most,  the  caprices  of  an  evil  power. 
The  form  of  the  tragedy  was  against  its  success  on  the 
stage,  but  in  the  choruses  the  lyric  and  reflective  side  of 
Schiller's  genius  found  a  congenial  medium  of  expression. 
Meanwhile  Schiller's  interest  in  Greek  tragedy  led  him 
to  translate  the  most  Greek  of  all  Shakespeare's  plays, 
Macbeth  (1801);  he  also,  about  the  same  time,  made  a 
German  version  of  Gozzi's  comedy  Turandot  (1802), 
translated  a  couple  of  lighter  French  comedies  by  L.  B. 
Picard,  and,  in  the  last  months  of  his  life,  Racine's 
Pkedre  (1805).  His  last  tragedy,  Wilhelm  Tell  (1804), 
shows  a  complete  emancipation  from  the  narrow  classicism 
which  had  led  to  the  blind  alley  of  Die  Braiitvon  Messina, 
With  Wilhelm  Tell,  more  than  with  any  other  of  his  trage- 
dies since  Die  Rduber,  Schiller  widened  the  province  of  the 
drama  ;  here,  for  the  first  time,  he  has  brought  the  action 
and  the  fate  of  a  whole  nation  within  the  compass  of  five 
acts.  Wilhelm  Tell  is  an  epic,  panoramic  drama  in  which 
the  individual  hero  is  but  the  spokesman  of  his  people. 
The  theme  of  the  play  is  the  revolt  of  the  Swiss  against 
the  tyranny  of  their  Austrian  rulers.  The  national  dis- 
content is  fanned  into  open  rebellion  by  the  caprice  of 
the  Landvogt  Gessler  :  Tell  refuses  to  bend  the  knee  to 
Gessler's  cap,  erected  on  a  pole  in  the  market-place 


176      THE    CULMINATION    OF    WEIMAR    CLASSICISM. 

of  Altdorf,  and  for  this  contempt  is  condemned  by  the 
Landvogt  to  shoot  with  his  cross-bow  an  apple  placed 
on  his  son's  head.  He  succeeds,  but  boldly  confesses 
that  the  second  arrow  he  holds  in  readiness  was  intended 
for  the  tyrant,  had  the  first  killed  his  child.  Tell  is 
thrown  into  chains  and  conveyed  by  boat  to  Kiissnacht, 
but  on  the  way  a  storm  arises  and  he  has  to  be  released 
to  steer  the  boat ;  he  brings  it  sufficiently  near  to  the 
land  to  allow  him  to  leap  ashore  and  make  good  his 
escape.  Meanwhile  the  representatives  of  the  four  Forest 
Cantons  assemble  on  the  Riitli  above  the  lake  and  swear 
to  take  common  action  against  the  tyranny  under  which 
they  suffer ;  and  when  Gessler  falls  by  Tell's  arrow  in  the 
narrow  way  near  Kiissnacht,  his  assassination  appears  as 
the  righteous  vindication  of  a  suffering  people  rather  than 
the  personal  vengeance  of  a  single  individual.  The  last 
act,  in  which  Tell's  deed  is  thrown  into  relief  as  an 
impersonal  national  achievement  by  comparison  with  the 
assassination  of  the  Austrian  Emperor  by  Duke  Johann 
of  Swabia,  is  lacking  in  organic  connection  with  the  main 
theme. 

Wilhehn  Tell  was  the  last  drama  it  was  given  to  Schiller 
to  complete.  In  January  1805  he  began  Demetrius,  the 
story  of  the  Russian  pretender  who  only  realises  that  he 
is  not  the  man  he  has  given  himself  out  to  be,  when 
it  is  too  late  to  retract.  This  would,  no  doubt, 
have  been  still  another  step  forward  in  Schiller's  eman- 
cipation from  classicism  ;  but  he  had  not  quite  finished 
the  second  act  when  the  fatal  illness  overtook  him  from 
which  he  died  on  May  9,  1805. 

Schiller  has  been  for  so  long  surrounded  by  a  halo 
as  pre-eminently  the  national  poet  of  the  German  people, 
that  it  is  difficult  for  modern  criticism  to  arrive  at  a  final 
judgment  of  his  place  in  the  literary  history  of  Europe. 
His  writings  are  inspired  by  a  noble  idealism,  a  lofty 
aspiration  and  enthusiasm,  but,  as  the  generation  of 
to-day  in  Germany  has  begun  to  realise,  these  things  have 
less  meaning  and  vitality  for  us  now  than  the  impartial 
realism  of  Goethe's  calm  outlook  on  life.  Schiller  was 


SCHILLER'S  PLACE  IN  LITERATURE.         177 

too  deeply  immersed  in  the  classic  movement  of  the 
eighteenth  century  to  be  numbered  among  the  few  great 
poets  who  are  for  all  time.  He  was  above  all  things 
a  fighter ;  he  went  through  life  as  a  partisan,  a  fiery 
champion  of  high  causes ;  the  calm,  dispassionate  wis- 
dom of  Goethe  was  never  his.  None  the  less,  he  is 
Germany's  greatest  dramatic  poet,  and  has  put  his  stamp, 
as  no  second  poet,  on  the  entire  German  drama  of  the 
after-time. 


CHAPTER    XVII. 

MINOR  WRITERS  OF  THE  CLASSICAL  PERIOD  ; 
GOETHE'S  OLD  AGE. 

IN  following  to  their  close  the  lives  of  Goethe  and  Schiller, 
we  have  been  carried  beyond  the  limits  of  the  eighteenth 
century ;  we  must  now  return  to  consider  the  general  state 
of  German  letters  in  the  epoch  of  Weimar  classicism, 
that  is  to  say,  in  the  years  that  lay  between  the  passing  of 
the  "Sturm  und  Drang"  and  the  rise  of  Romanticism. 
In  this  period  of  what  might  be  called  humanitarian 
classicism,  the  intellectual  movement  of  the  "Aufklarung," 
the  superseding  of  pseudo- classicism  by  a  truer  and 
more  genuinely  antique  classicism,  reached  a  culmination  ; 
all  that  was  best  in  the  intellectual  movement  of  the 
eighteenth  century  is  concentrated  in  its  last  ten  or  twenty 
years. 

The  entire  epoch  is  dominated  by  the  gigantic  figure 
of  Immanuel  Kant  (1724-1804),  alike  the  maturest 
product  of  rationalism  and  the  spiritual  liberator  of 
modern  Europe.  Kant  was  born  and  died  at  Konigs- 
berg ;  his  whole  life  long  he  was  associated  with  that 
town  and  he  taught  at  its  university  from  1755  onwards. 
The  fruits  of  his  philosophy  are  to  be  seen  in  the  three 
epoch  -  making  treatises  he  published  between  his  fifty- 
seventh  and  sixty-sixth  year  :  Kritik  der  reinen  Vernunft 
(1781),  Kritik  der  praktischen  Vernunft  (1788),  and 
Kritik  der  Urteilskraft  (1790).  The  word  which  is 
common  to  all  these  titles  sums  up  the  method  and 
spirit  of  Kant's  philosophy ;  he  was  the  founder  of  a 


KANT   AND    FICHTE.  179 

"  critical  "  philosophy.  Just  as  Descartes,  a  century  and 
a  half  earlier,  had  with  one  magic  phrase  swept  away 
the  dry  formalism  of  mediaeval  scholasticism,  so  now 
Kant  destroyed  the  ungrounded  speculation  and  dog- 
matising metaphysics  into  which  Cartesianism  had  de- 
generated. When  Kant  declared  that  the  only  way 
to  certainty  concerning  the  unknown  was  through  the 
critical  study  of  the  human  mind,  it  was  a  triumph 
for  the  "Aufklarung"  of  which  the  older  "Aufklarer" 
could  not  have  dreamed.  Kant  based  his  metaphysics 
on  an  understanding  of  the  processes  and  the  limita- 
tions of  the  intelligence,  and  the  result  of  his  investi- 
gations is  the  subject  of  his  three  treatises.  The  first 
of  these  discusses  the  pure  reason,  and  has  become  an 
indispensable  basis  for  all  modern  metaphysics ;  the 
second  analyses  the  practical  reason,  and  insists  on  sub- 
ordination of  the  practical  life  to  the  will  and  implicit 
obedience  to  the  moral  law  as  the  first  conditions 
of  the  higher  life,  a  doctrine  of  duty  for  duty's  sake, 
which  reacted  on  the  character  of  the  German  people 
and  helped  to  weld  them  into  a  great  nation.  Lastly, 
the  third  Kritik  laid  the  foundation  of  the  aesthetic  theory 
of  the  German  classical  period  which,  as  we  have  seen, 
Schiller  helped  materially  to  develop. 

The  bracing  influence  of  the  Kantian  philosophy  is 
nowhere  more  apparent  than  in  the  work  of  Kant's  first 
important  successor,  J.  G.  Fichte  (1762-1814).  Fichte  was 
a  native  of  the  Oberlausitz  in  Saxony,  and  had  studied 
under  Kant  in  Konigsberg.  Appointed  professor  at 
Jena  in  1794,  the  year  in  which  his  Wissenschaftslehre 
appeared,  he  had  only  begun  to  attract  students  from 
all  parts  of  Germany  when  he  was  accused  of  atheism 
and  compelled  to  resign.  For  a  time  he  was  in  Erlangen, 
and  subsequently,  in  1810,  was  appointed  the  first  rector 
of  the  new  university  of  Berlin.  German  idealism,  which 
with  Kant  had  emerged  purified  and  ennobled  from  the 
older  rationalism,  was  carried  by  Fichte  to  a  still  higher 
point;  for  it  was  he  who  first  grasped  the  significance 
of  the  individualistic  tendency  in  Kant's  thinking;  he 


l8o       MINOR    WRITERS    OF    THE    CLASSICAL    PERIOD. 

first  gave  clear  expression  to  that  intensely  personal 
idealism  which  acted  like  a  ferment  on  the  literature  of 
the  time.  But  Fichte's  "  ego "  was  not  merely  a  meta- 
physical, but  also  a  moral  "  ego " ;  from  the  Kantian 
"categorical  imperative"  he  deduced  a  still  more  un- 
compromising conception  of  the  self-denying  duties  of 
the  moral  life  ;  and  he  repeated  again,  but  with  fuller 
knowledge  and  understanding,  the  dogmas  of  the  early 
thinkers  of  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang,"  that  "  personality  " 
is  the  highest  good  and  that  our  destinies  lie  in  our 
own  hands.  Fichte's  patriotic  earnestness,  which  finds 
its  expression  in  his  magnificent  Reden  an  die  deutsche 
Nation,  delivered  in  Berlin  in  the  winter  of  1807-8,  when 
the  German  people  lay  crushed  under  the  heel  of 
Napoleon,  was  a  factor  to  be  reckoned  with  in  the 
national  rising  of  1813  and  the  War  of  Liberation. 

It  is  impossible  here,  without  going  beyond  the  limits 
of  literary  history,  to  follow  the  influence  of  this  stimulat- 
ing idealism  on  the  many  currents  and  undercurrents  of 
German  intellectual  life  at  the  close  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  but  one  name  must  at  least  be  mentioned,  that 
of  Wilhelm  von  Humboldt  (1767-1835).  Humboldt 
was  personally  associated  with  the  Weimar  literary 
circle,  and  one  of  the  intellectual  makers  of  modern 
Germany.  As  Prussian  Minister  of  Education  he  directed 
the  stream  of  higher  culture  into  practical  channels,  and 
gave  Germany  a  system  of  national  education.  As  a 
scholar  he  contributed  to  the  science  of  comparative 
philology ;  his  translations  from  the  Greek  show  genuine 
poetic  power,  and  his  critical  study  of  Hermann  iind 
Dorothea  (Asthetische  Versuche,  1799)  justifies  the  con- 
fidence which  Goethe  and  Schiller  placed  in  his  literary 
judgment. 

A  characteristic  illustration  of  the  effect  of  this  new 
wine  in  old  bottles,  this  tonic  idealism  on  the  easy-going 
rationalism  of  the  foregoing  period,  is  to  be  seen  in 
the  representative  novelist  of  these  years,  Jean  Paul 
Friedrich  Richter,  or,  as  he  preferred  to  sign  himself, 
"Jean  Paul"  (1763-1825).  When  Richter  first  sue- 


JEAN    PAUL    FRIEDRICH    RICHTER.  l8l 

ceeded  in  attracting  attention  as  an  author  with  Die 
unsichtbare  Loge  in  1793,  he  had  behind  him  a  life  of 
suffering  and  privation,  such  as  was  only  too  commonly 
the  lot  of  German  writers  in  the  eighteenth  century.  He 
was  by  birth  a  Franconian,  and,  like  his  nation,  com- 
bined in  many  ways  characteristics  of  the  Low  and  the 
High  German.  Richter's  books  are  full  of  the  contrasts 
and  incongruities  which  we  associate  with  the  writers  of 
a  transition  period.  Into  the  old  type  of  novel  which 
Sterne  had  given  to  eighteenth-century  Europe,  he  forced 
the  idealism  and  individualism  of  the  age  of  Fichte ;  he 
combined  the  crudities  of  the  German  family-romance  of 
the  "  Sturm  und  Drang "  with  the  new  fiction  which 
Goethe's  Wilhelm  Meister  had  inaugurated.  A  kindly, 
sentimental  humour  and  irony,  of  which  again  Sterne  was 
the  original  source,  is  to  be  found  side  by  side  with 
morbid,  sociological  problems  and  pleas  for  individual 
licence ;  and,  above  all  this,  a  soaring  Germanic  imagina- 
tion which,  in  its  most  daring  flights,  shows  an  affinity 
with  that  of  Klopstock  or  of  the  German  mystics  of  the 
early  seventeenth  century. 

The  series  of  Richter's  greater  novels  begins  with 
Hesperus  (1795),  'n  which  there  is  still  much  of  the 
"  Sturm  und  Drang "  ;  with  the  charming  prose  idyll  of 
Quintus  Fixlein  (1796)  he  found,  however,  a  more  con- 
genial channel  for  his  talent.  His  third  important  book, 
B/umen-,  Frucht-  und  Dornstiicke,  oder  Ehestand,  Tod  und 
Hochzeit  des  Armenadvokaten  Siebenkds  (1796-97),  is  as 
fantastic  as  its  title ;  it  combines  the  idyllic  and  sentimen- 
tal tone  of  Quintus  Fixlein  with  a  flagrant  defiance  of 
social  conventions  in  the  spirit  of  the  early  "  Sturm  und 
Drang."  Richter's  masterpiece  is  Titan  (1800-3),  on 
which  the  influence  of  Wilhelm  Meister  is  sufficiently 
strong  to  justify  us  in  classing  it  with  the  early  novels  of 
the  Romantic  School.  The  crudities  of  Richter's  earlier 
books  have  here  disappeared,  and  the  main  problem  of 
the  story — the  sentimental  education  of  a  young  prince 
at  the  hands  of  three  women,  who  each  contribute  to  the 
moulding  of  his  character  and  help  him  to  discover  his 


l82       MINOR    WRITERS    OF    THE    CLASSICAL    PERIOD. 

true  self — is  a  characteristically  Romantic  one.  Of 
Richter's  later  writings,  idyllic  studies  of  the  life  he  knew, 
such  as  Der  Jubelsenior  (1797),  Flegeljahre  (1804-5),  and 
Leben  Fibels  (1812)  are  the  most  readable  to-day,  more 
readable  than  the  ambitious  but  lumbering  novel  Der  Komet 
(1820-22).  Richter  is  an  illustration  of  the  nemesis 
which  a  contempt  for  artistic  form  brings  with  it ;  in  the 
early  nineteenth  century  the  most  popular  of  German 
novelists— and  the  opinion  of  his  own  countrymen  was 
shared  by  De  Quincey  and  Carlyle  in  England, — he  is 
nowadays  hardly  read  at  all. 

The  coming  epoch  of  Romanticism  was  more  clearly 
reflected  in  lyric  poetry  at  the  turn  of  the  century,  and 
that  mainly  because  the  lyric  is  able  to  avoid  the  dis- 
turbing vicissitudes  to  which  other  forms  of  literature 
are  exposed ;  its  development  is  more  continuous  and 
gradual.  The  younger  generation  departed  far  from 
Goethe's  type  of  drama,  and  they  no  doubt  believed 
they  had  advanced  beyond  Wilhelm  Meister  in  their 
novels,  but  Goethe's  shorter  poems  remained  for  them 
the  unsurpassable  models  of  lyric  expression.  The 
history  of  the  lyric  in  these  years  is  not  easy  to  follow, 
for  its  materials  have  to  be  sought  less  in  the  works  of 
eminent  poets  than  in  the  contributions  to  the  many 
"  Musenalmanache "  which  flooded  the  German  book- 
markets.  Of  the  better  known  minor  poets  of  the  age 
Friedrich  von  Matthisson  (1761-1831)  maybe  mentioned, 
a  native  of  Magdeburg,  whose  sentimental,  elegiac  lyrics 
show  an  affinity  with  those  of  the  Gottingen  school. 
A.  similar  old-world  sentiment,  varied  occasionally  by 
more  vigorous  strains,  is  to  be  found  in  the  lyrics, 
published  in  1793,  of  the  Swiss  poet,  J.  G.  von  Salis- 
Seewis  (1762-1834),  author  of  the  little  poem  which 
Longfellow  has  made  a  household  word  in  English- 
speaking  lands,  Ins  stille  Land  ("  Into  that  silent 
Land ").  To  the  past  rather  than  to  the  future  belongs 
also  G.  L.  Kosegarten  (1758-1818),  a  Mecklenburg  poet 
who  followed  in  the  footsteps  of  his  fellow-countryman 
Voss ;  but  neither  his  lyrics  nor  his  epics  (Jucunde, 


FRIEDRICH    HOLDKRLIN.  183 

1808),  in  spite  of  an  obvious  effort  to  strike  a  higher 
note  and  appeal  to  a  higher  literary  culture,  have  that 
original  force  and  racy  flavour  of  the  soil  which  attract 
us  in  Voss's  Luise.  The  lyric  in  dialect  is  represented 
by  J.  P.  Hebel  (1760-1826),  a  native  of  Basel,  whose 
Akmannische  Gedichte  (1803)  are  composed  in  the  Ger- 
man dialect  of  the  southern  Schwarzwald.  Lastly,  mention 
has  to  be  made  of  C.  A.  Tiedge  (1752-1841),  the  once 
popular  author  of  a  didactic  poem,  Urania  (1801);  but 
Tiedge  is  long  forgotten,  and  may  be  regarded  as  the 
last  representative  in  literature  of  the  undisguised  didac- 
ticism of  the  German  "Aufklarung." 

While  these  poets  belong,  one  and  all,  to  the  past, 
another  writer  of  this  age,  Friedrich  Holderlin  (1770-1843), 
belongs  to  the  future ;  although  he  was  not  personally 
associated  with  the  Romantic  School,  his  temperament 
and  poetic  faculty  were  essentially  Romantic.  A  fellow- 
countryman  of  Schiller's,  he  passed  an  unhappy  and 
chequered  life,  which  was  cut  short  by  insanity  at  the  age 
of  thirty-two;  thus,  from  1802  onwards,  he  ceased  to 
exist  for  literature,  although  he  did  not  die  until  1843. 
In  common  with  the  Romanticists  he  was  filled  with  a 
passionate  discontent;  but  while  they  took  refuge  from 
the  prosaic  world  into  which  they  were  born,  in  the 
Middle  Ages,  Holderlin  sought  it  in  the  culture  of  ancient 
Greece.  His  most  ambitious  book  is  a  novel  in  let- 
ters, Hyperion,  oder  der  Eremit  in  Griechenland,  which 
appeared  in  two  volumes  in  1797  and  1799;  it  purports 
to  be  a  chapter  from  contemporary,  or  almost  con- 
temporary Greek  history,  and  describes  the  Greek 
struggle  for  independence  against  the  Turks ;  its  hero 
is  a  dreamy,  fervid  Werther,  whose  enthusiasm  oscillates 
between  the  two  poles  of  nature  and  Greek  antiquity. 
Greece  and  nature,  these,  too,  are  the  dominant  notes  of 
Holderlin's  lyric  poetry ;  and  he  is,  above  all  things,  a 
lyric  poet.  Perhaps,  indeed,  he  is  best  described  as  a 
mediator  between  the  two  centuries ;  he  combines  the 
reflective  lyric  of  the  eighteenth  century  with  a  Ro- 
mantic pantheism  and  the  pessimism  of  a  more  modern 


184       MINOR    WRITERS    OF    THE    CLASSICAL    PERIOD. 

"  Weitschmerz."  He  stands  between  Klopstock  and 
Schiller  on  the  one  side  and  the  Romantic  lyric  of  the 
nineteenth  century  on  the  other. 

In  spite  of  the  enormous  impetus  given  to  the  German 
drama  by  Schiller,  there  was  no  form  of  literature  where 
a  wider  gulf  separated  the  Weimar  poets  from  the  rank 
and  file  of  German  writers.  The  two  forms  of  play 
associated  particularly  with  the  movement  of  "  Sturm 
und  Drang,"  namely,  the  "  Ritterdrama  "  and  the  domestic 
tragedy,  were  neither  of  them  capable  of  development ; 
decay  was  inherent  in  them  from  the  first.  The  "  Ritter- 
drama," which  at  no  time  made  much  literary  pretension, 
lost  the  little  dignity  it  had  by  its  extravagant  sensation- 
alism, and  sank  to  the  level  of  a  crude  popular  entertain- 
ment ;  while  the  "  biirgerliche  Tragodie"  deteriorated 
steadily  from  Schiller  to  Iffland  and  from  Iffland  to 
Kotzebue.  August  von  Kotzebue  (1761-1819)  was  no 
genius,  but  he  was  a  playwright  with  a  marvellously  keen 
understanding  for  the  needs  of  the  stage.  We  have  only 
to  look  at  the  repertory  lists  of  the  German  theatres  at 
the  zenith  of  the  classical  era  to  see  how  completely  he 
dominated  the  stage.  Nor  was  his  success  confined  to 
Germany ;  his  plays  were  translated  into  every  language, 
and  he  was  the  most  popular  playwright  in  Europe  until 
the  rise  of  Scribe  in  the  following  generation.  His  talent 
was,  however,  purely  a  talent  for  the  theatre,  an  ability  to 
create  effective  stage  situations  and  striking  stage  figures, 
which  gave  the  actors  unbounded  opportunities.  In 
higher  poetic  or  literary  qualities  he  was  more  deficient 
than  even  Iffland.  Among  his  most  popular  plays  in  their 
day  were  Menschenhass  und  Rene  (i  789),  Die  Indianer  in 
England  (1789),  Die  Spanier  in  Peru  (1796),  and  Die 
deutschen  Kleinstadter  (1803),  the  last  -  mentioned  a 
comedy  that  is  even  still  occasionally  seen  on  the 
German  stage. 

Before  passing  to  the  new  era  of  German  literature, 
which  was  inaugurated  by  the  Romantic  School,  we  have 
to  follow  to  its  close  the  life  of  Goethe.  Schiller's  death 
had  left  an  irreparable  gap  in  his  life  ;  he,  the  aristocrat 


GOETHE'S  "  WAHLVERWANDTSCHAFTEN."     185 

who  held  aloof  from  the  movement  of  his  time,  was 
lonelier  than  ever.  Even  with  the  political  awakening  of 
his  nation  Goethe  had  little  sympathy ;  Napoleon,  whose 
genius  overawed  him,  appeared  to  him  as  the  man  of 
destiny,  against  whom  it  was  hopeless  to  struggle  :  and 
the  triumph  of  German  nationalism  in  1813  meant  com- 
paratively little  to  this  cosmopolite  of  the  old  regime.  In 
literature,  in  spite  of  Faust,  Goethe  remained  faithful  to 
his  classic  ideals.  Die  Wahlverwandtschaften,  which  ap- 
peared in  1809,  is  a  novel  of  classic  form  and  classic 
beauty,  although  Goethe  here  returned  to  everyday  reali- 
ties and  dealt  with  them  from  a  personal  standpoint.  In 
the  poet's  work  this  book  mediates,  one  might  say,  between 
the  subjective  methods  of  his  first  period  and  that  ex- 
treme of  objectivity  which  had  resulted  in  Die  natilrliche 
Tochter  and  Pandora.  Die  Wahlverwandtschaften  is  a  study 
of  four  people  who  seek  out,  in  defiance  of  social  and 
legal  conventions,  their  "  elective  affinities,"  and  virtually 
succumb  before  the  tyranny  of  these  conventions  ;  it  is  the 
novel  of  a  scientist,  who  watches  coldly  and  impersonally 
the  progress  of  a  pathological  and  psychological  experi- 
ment. The  freshness  of  Wilhelm  Meister  is  missing,  but 
in  its  place  has  come  a  more  penetrating  insight  into  the 
workings  of  mind  and  heart:  it  is  the  "scientific"  point 
of  view  from  which  Goethe  regards  his  theme  that  makes 
Die  Wahlverwandtschaften  so  interesting  a  forerunner  of 
the  later  developments  of  the  European  novel. 

In  1811  the  second  of  the  chief  works  of  Goethe's 
later  years  began  to  appear,  his  autobiography,  Aim 
nieinem  Leben :  Dichtung  und  Wahrheii  (1811-33),  w'tn 
which  may  be  associated  his  Italienische  Reise  (1816-17) 
and  Die  Campagne  in  Frankreich  (1822).  The  auto- 
biography only  extends  as  far  as  the  close  of  Goethe's 
Frankfort  life  in  1775  ;  the  period  which  the  poet  recalls 
with  such  extraordinary  vividness  lay  separated  from  him 
by  half  an  ordinary  lifetime.  Letters  and  contemporary 
documents  amply  prove,  however,  that  the  truth  of  fact 
is  here  not  unduly  veiled  in  poetry ;  indeed,  the  title 
Dichtutig  und  Wahrheit  would  seem  merely  to  imply  that 


i86  GOETHE'S  OLD  AGE. 

Goethe  had  subordinated  the  facts  and  events  of  his  life 
to  an  artistic  plan,  and  had  interpreted  them  in  view  of 
his  future  development ;  the  lights  and  shadows  are 
adjusted  by  the  hand  of  the  artist  rather  than  of  the 
chronicler,  and  over  the  whole  lies  the  calm  optimism 
of  the  poet's  later  years. 

Meanwhile  Goethe's  life  was  becoming  fuller  and  fuller 
as  the  years  went  on.  His  interest  in  art  showed  no  abate- 
ment;  the  journal,  Uber  Kunst  und  Altertum  (1816-32), 
which  took  the  place  of  the  earlier  Propylden,  now  be- 
came the  general  receptacle  for  his  criticism.  Science,  too, 
engrossed  him  more  and  more  with  his  advancing  years. 
To  optics  he  contributed  studies  on  light  and  colour 
(Beitrdge  ztir  Optik,  1791-92;  Zur  Farbenlehre,  1810), 
in  which  he  doggedly  combated  the  Newtonian  theory  of 
the  propagation  of  light  by  means  of  waves;  and  in 
geology  he  maintained  the  old  "Neptunian"  theory  of 
the  exclusively  aqueous  origin  of  the  earth's  crust  against 
the  "  Vulcanists,"  or  believers  in  its  igneous  origin.  In 
those  sciences  his  work  was  only  negatively  important ; 
but  in  anatomy  and  botany  (Die  Metamorphose  der 
Pflanzen,  1790,  and  Zur  Morphologic,  1817-22)  he 
laid  down  fundamental  principles  of  morphological 
development  which  give  him  an  important  place  among 
Darwin's  predecessors.  His  acknowledged  position  at  the 
head  of  German  letters  brought  him  into  touch  with  the 
intellectual  aristocracy  not  merely  of  German  -  speaking 
lands,  but  of  all  Europe  ;  his  correspondence  was  endless, 
and  his  diaries  bear  witness  to  the  constant  stream  of 
visitors  to  Weimar. 

Once  more,  in  1819,  Goethe's  lyric  genius  burst  forth 
with  renewed  vigour  in  Der  westostliche  Divan.  The 
spontaneous  beauty  with  which  he  here  gives  voice  to 
feelings  that  were  by  no  means  all  imagined,  shows  with 
what  difficulty  Goethe  grew  old.  The  only  indication 
that  the  lyrics  of  1819  were  not  the  creation  of  a  young 
poet  is  the  reflective  tone  that  occasionally  creeps  in,  and 
the  apophthegmatic  concentration  of  form  in  which  he 
expresses  his  ripe  wisdom.  Der  Westostliche  Divan  is 


"  DER    WEST6STLICHE    DIVAN"    AND    "  FAUST."     187 

an  imitation  of  the  Divan  of  the  Persian  poet  Hafiz,  which 
had  been  translated  into  German  a  few  years  previously, 
and  it  gave  oriental  poetry  a  vogue  in  Germany  that 
lasted  for  forty  years.  Wilhelm  Meisters  Wanderjahre, 
which  has  already  been  discussed,  followed  in  1821, 
while  the  last  years  of  Goethe's  life  were  taken  up  with  the 
completion  of  his  life-work,  Faust,  the  second  part  of 
which  appeared  in  1832,  a  few  months  after  his  death. 

The  position  which  Faust  occupies  in  Goethe's  life  has 
no  parallel  in  the  life  of  any  other  of  the  world's  great 
poets.  A  favourite  theme  of  the  writers  of  the  "  Sturm 
und  Drang,"  Faust's  story  had  been  familiar  to  Goethe 
from  his  earliest  years  onward ;  it  must  necessarily  have 
attracted  his  attention  in  Leipzig,  the  town  of  "  Auer- 
bach's  Keller,"  and  doubtless  also  during  the  months  of 
convalescence  in  Frankfort,  when  he  was  interested  in 
alchemy  and  magic.  After  the  "Sturm  und  Drang"  set 
in,  Faust  had  the  first  place  in  Goethe's  heart,  and  when 
he  left  Frankfort  for  Weimar  in  1775,  ne  took  with  him 
the  play  more  or  less  completed  in  the  form  we  now  know 
as  the  Urfaust.  In  Weimar  Faust  was  not  forgotten, 
although  in  the  early  years  little  or  nothing  was  added  to 
it,  and  it  accompanied  the  poet  to  Italy  where  one  or  two 
new  scenes  were  written  and  the  whole  prepared  for  pub- 
lication in  1790  as  Faust,  ein  Fragment.  In  the  following 
years,  thanks  to  Schiller's  stimulus  and  insistence,  the 
yellowed  manuscript  of  the  poem  was  taken  out  once 
more,  scenes  were  again  added  and  the  whole  adapted 
to  a  wider  scheme,  whereby  Faust's  experiences  were 
invested  with  a  subtle  problematic  significance.  In 
1808  appeared  the  First  Part.  Slowly  but  with  fewer 
interruptions,  the  Second  Part  took  shape,  reflecting  as 
it  progressed  the  various  phases  of  Goethe's  own  later 
thought,  his  classicism  and  even  his  scientific  interests. 
The  final  touches  were  not  put  to  the  work  until  the 
very  last  months  of  the  poet's  life. 

A  theme  such  as  that  of  Faust  is  uniquely  adapted  to 
mirror  the  temperament  of  the  German  people ;  even 
in  Reformation  times,  when  the  story  first  took  form,  it  was 


188  GOETHE'S  OLD  AGE. 

seized  upon  to  embody  the  Germanic  revolt  against  the 
spiritual  fetters  of  Catholicism,  and  to  voice  the  sixteenth 
century's  dreams  of  infinite  power  and  infinite  enjoyment. 
Under  the  "Sturm  und  Drang"  Faust  was  again  the 
"  Ubermensch,"  the  rebel  against  laws  divine  and  human, 
whose  tragic  fate  is  his  quest  for  the  unattainable  ;  and  in 
Goethe's  hands  this  Faust  becomes  a  still  more  complete 
impersonation  of  the  aspiration  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
He  is  the  "  Sturmer  und  Dranger  "  who  sets  law  at  de- 
fiance, who  will,  as  it  were,  merge  the  whole  world  in  his 
"  ego " ;  but  he  is  at  the  same  time  imbued  by  Goethe 
with  intellectual  aspirations  which  effectually  rule  out  those 
moral  platitudes  the  earlier  writers  who  had  treated  the 
theme  were  too  ready  to  introduce.  In  Goethe's  hands 
Faust  is  no  criminal  egoist ;  he  has  become  the  imper- 
sonation of  man's  most  precious  qualities.  He  has 
ceased  to  be  the  abnormally  developed  individual  who 
merely  tilts  against  the  wall  of  law  and  convention,  and 
has  become  a  type  of  aspiring  humanity.  To  give  the 
play  a  still  more  universal  significance,  Goethe  fitted  it 
into  a  new  framework,  made  it  unroll,  like  a  mystery-play 
of  the  Middle  Ages,  against  a  spiritual  background  in 
which  Satan  struggles  with  God  for  Faust's  possession. 
Faust,  when  the  drama  opens,  has  already  exhausted 
all  knowledge  and  wisdom  :  and  the  moment  has  come 
when  he  is  ready  to  take  leave  of  an  existence,  of  the 
vanity  of  which  he  is  convinced.  In  this  moment  it 
would  seem  as  if  a  Divine  force  takes  possession  of 
him  ;  Easter  bells  recall  him  to  earth,  the  careless,  happy 
holiday  folk  remind  him  of  the  ever-renewing  vitality  of 
humanity.  The  moment  is  ripe  for  Mephistopheles,  that 
emissary  of  the  powers  of  evil,  who,  after  all,  is  but  the 
servant  of  God,  to  present  himself  to  Faust.  A  pact  is 
made  and  signed  in  Faust's  blood.  Mephistopheles  agrees 
to  stand  at  Faust's  command,  to  open  up  to  him  worlds 
of  power  and  enjoyment,  of  which  he  has  not  even 
dreamed  ;  and  in  return  for  this  service,  Faust  signs  him- 
self away  to  Mephistopheles ;  but  only  on  the  condition 
that  the  latter  succeeds  in  satiating  him,  in  destroying 


"  FAUST."  l8g 

his  will  to  dream,  to  strive,  and  to  desire.  Mephistopheles 
now  proceeds  to  lead  his  victim  through  various  forms 
of  pleasure  —  the  crude  sensuality  of  the  wine -house, 
the  tragic  passion  for  Gretchen,  the  sense-benumbing 
orgies  of  the  Brocken — but  without  the  expected  result. 
The  devil  is  still  foiled ;  for  the  love  with  which  Gretchen 
has  inspired  Faust,  instead  of  dragging  him  down,  as 
Mephistopheles  had  hoped,  has  filled  him  with  a  tragic 
restlessness  against  which  his  lures  are  powerless.  With 
Gretchen's  death  in  prison  the  First  Part  closes. 

From  the  narrow  world  of  personal  joys  and  sufferings 
Faust  passes  in  Part  II.  into  the  great  world  of  humanity  at 
large.  He  is  no  longer  merely  the  strong  individual  with 
personal  desires  to  satisfy ;  he  has  become  symbolic  of  the 
race.  At  the  court  of  the  Kaiser,  Mephistopheles  intro- 
duces him  to  a  motley  life  where  manifold  social  questions 
are  opened  up ;  and  at  this  court  Faust,  by  virtue  of  a 
magic  key,  unlocks  the  door  of  antiquity.  He  conjures 
up  Helen  of  Troy,  and  himself  loves  the  phantom  he  has 
brought  back  to  life.  With  the  help  of  a  small  being, 
the  "  Homunculus,"  a  creation  of  alchemistic  science, 
he  makes  his  way  back  through  the  centuries  to  Greek 
antiquity,  where  he  takes  part  in  the  "  Klassische  Wal- 
purgisnacht,"  the  greatest  possible  contrast  to  the  wild 
Germanic  carnival  on  the  Brocken  in  Part  I.  Amidst  the 
classic  harmony  of  the  ancient  world,  Faust  sees  the 
real  Helen  ;  she  takes  refuge  in  his  castle  from  the  wrath 
of  Menelaus.  Faust  and  she  are  united,  the  romantic 
Germanic  soul  with  the  Greek  ideal  beauty ;  and  from 
their  union  springs  the  child  Euphorion,  in  whom 
Goethe  allegorised  Byron.  Euphorion  loses  his  brief  life 
in  the  quest  of  too  high  an  ideal ;  Helen  vanishes  into 
air  and  Faust  is  brought  back  by  Mephistopheles  into 
the  real  world,  the  world  of  political  machinations,  of 
diplomacy  and  war,  of  industry  and  commerce.  Here 
Faust  attains  to  what  in  Goethe's  mind  was  the  final  goal 
of  human  life,  a  practical,  beneficent  activity ;  his  mighty 
energy  has  won  new  land  from  the  sea,  and  at  his  feet  he 
sees  a  happy,  flourishing  community  of  active  men.  Faust 


igo  GOETHE'S  OLD  AGE. 

is  now  a  hundred  years  old  and  cannot  live  much  longer ; 
Mephistopheles  believes  that  the  hour  of  his  triumph  has  at 
last  come,  for  there  is  nothing  left  for  Faust  to  strive  for. 
Moreover,  sinister  figures  are  approaching  :  Want,  Guilt, 
Need,  Care, — and  Death  himself  is  not  far  off.  But  the 
eternal  striving  in  Faust's  breast  is  still  insatiable ;  he 
sinks  into  the  grave  convinced  that  the  highest  wisdom  is 
summed  up  in  the  words,  that  life  and  freedom  are  only 
for  him  who  daily  conquers  them  anew.  Only  with  death 
itself  does  the  moment  come  when  Faust  can  "  bid  the 
passing  moment  stay."  Mephistopheles  believes  that  his 
wager  with  God  is  won ;  he  summons  his  devils  to  carry 
off  his  victim  :  but  the  angels  of  the  heavenly  host  descend 
and  do  battle  with  roses  for  the  soul  of  the  eternal  striver. 
Once  again  Goethe's  magnificent  imagination  unfolds 
itself  in  the  poetry  of  this  last  act,  where  Faust's  soul 
passes  upwards  through  the  hierarchy  of  mediaeval  Christi- 
anity to  the  Virgin,  at  whose  feet  a  penitent,  the  Gretchen 
of  former  days,  intercedes  for  him. 

Such  was  the  fitting  culmination  to  the  life  of  Germany's 
greatest,  most  universal  poet,  who  stood  like  a  colossus 
amidst  his  age,  whose  work  is  an  epitome  of  a  whole  cen- 
tury of  Germany's  literary  history.  It  is  sometimes,  indeed, 
difficult  to  realise  that  this  Goethe,  who  dominated  the 
age  of  German  classicism  and  saw  Romanticism  rise  and 
fall,  who  lived  into  the  modern  era  of  steam  and  electricity, 
began  his  career  in  the  Leipzig  of  Gottsched  and  was  the 
leader  of  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang."  When  Goethe  passed 
away  in  Weimar  on  the  22nd  of  March  1832,  a  great  age 
in  European  letters  had  come  to  a  close. 

At  the  opening  of  the  eighteenth  century  the  German- 
speaking  peoples  were  without  a  living  literature  they 
could  call  their  own,  and  stood  in  abject  spiritual  slavery  to 
France  ;  that  century  left  them  as  the  leading  intellectual 
force  in  Europe.  From  Canitz  and  Besser  to  Goethe  and 
Schiller  the  vast  distance  was  covered  with  miraculous 
rapidity,  and  almost  within  the  span  of  a  single  genera- 
tion. No  wonder  this  eighteenth  century  was  a  feverish 
age  in  Germany ;  compared  with  it,  the  leisurely  culture 


THE    EIGHTEENTH    CENTURY    IN    GERMANY.       IQI 

of  England,  which  accepted  the  displacement  of  Restora- 
tion ideals  and  the  "return  to  nature "  as  a  matter  of 
course,  or  the  overripe  intellectualism  of  France  with  all 
her  glorious  memories  of  the  "grand  siecle,"  was  the 
greatest  possible  contrast.  The  time-spirit  was  clearly 
no  gentle,  beneficent  deity  to  Germany  as  it  was  to 
England,  but  rather  a  relentless  Chronos,  who  devoured 
his  children  as  he  created  them,  and  brought  tragic  dis- 
appointment to  all  but  the  very  greatest  thinkers  and  poets. 
Yet  the  process  of  evolution  in  Germany  was  not  different 
from  elsewhere,  only  more  concentrated  and  more  intense. 
As  England  and  France,  Germany  had  to  take  the  step  into 
the  modern  time  which  consisted  in  discarding  classicism 
for  naturalness  ;  the  step  was  a  serious  and  even  revolu- 
tionary one,  but  Germany  succeeded  in  the  end  better  than 
her  neighbours  in  arriving  at  a  solution  of  the  problems 
of  the  eighteenth  century.  The  supreme  achievement  of 
that  century  was  neither  England's  material  and  political 
prosperity,  nor  France's  great  Revolution,  but  the  humane 
classicism  of  Weimar. 


IQ2 


CHAPTER    XVIII. 

THE     ROMANTIC      MOVEMENT. 

THE  future  of  German  poetry  did  not  lie  in  that  noble 
classicism  with  which  the  eighteenth  century  culminated, 
which  Goethe  and  Schiller  carried  to  its  highest  perfection 
in  Weimar;  the  classic  movement,  having  touched  its 
zenith,  exhausted  itself,  and  had  now  to  give  place  to 
another  unclassic  revival.  Just  as,  a  generation  earlier, 
German  individualism  had  asserted  itself  as  "  Sturm  und 
Drang,"  so  now  at  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century 
the  same  spirit  appears  again,  this  time  as  Romanticism. 
In  her  epochs  of  classicism  Germany's  influence  on  other 
literatures  has  been  small  out  of  all  proportion  to  her 
achievements,  but  ir^  periods  like  that  of  "Sturm  und 
Drang  "  and  Romanticism,  that  influence  has  been  almost 
disproportionately  great.  Thus,  on  the  threshold  of  the 
new  century  a  little  band  of  writers,  none  of  them  of  the 
first  order,  promulgated  ji  new  doctrine  which  made  the 
nineteenth  century  in  the  literatures  of  Europe  a  century 
of  Romanticism. 

This  doctrine  of  Romanticism  differed  from  that  of 
the  "Sturm  und  Drang"  as  impetuous  youth  differs 
from  mature  manhood ;  it  was  an  individualism  that  had 
passed  through  a  period  of  chastening  humanism  and 
enlightenment.  The  "Sturm  und  Drang"  had  been  a 
German  reproduction  oflhe  revoTroF^Rousseau  and,  above 
aTrfhingsTTco^cTastic  ;  it  aimed  at  destroying  rather  than 
building  up  ;  it  spTTmBd  barriers  and  boundaries  as  incon- 
venient hindrances  to  the  progress  of  the  individual.  The 


t~~e/v,  t  j^        J        'S. -.,    x;     .X-     A'l^uc  •-•  -- 

."5JUUA-.|      £UtX       "^i-?".  •..*•."        '    J-, 

THE    DOCTRINES    OF    ROMANTICISM.  193 

_new  movement  also  demanded  the  utmost  freedom  for 
trie"  individual ;  but  its  leaders  based  their  claim  not  so 
"much  on  personal  needs  as  on  an  ordered  conception  of 
the  universe,  in  which  the  inoHvicTual  (acuities'  were  'to. 
have  the  fullest  room  for  development.  They  broke  down, 
or,  it  may  be,  only  bridged  over,  the  barriers  they  found 
in  their  way,  less  with  a  view  to  gaining  more  freedom 
for  themselves,  as  to  arriving  at  a  more  perfect  freedom 
of  thinking  and  feeling  for  the  world.  They  spurned 
the  utilitarianism  which  confused  art  and  morality,  and 
had  dominated  the  greater  part  of  the  eighteenth  century ; 
but  they  demanded,  none  the  less,  that  life  and  art  should 
be  woven  into  one  great  harmonious  whole,  unhampered 
by  conflicting  ethics.  They  insisted  that  poetry  was  some- 
thing universal  and  that  it  should  permeate  all  domains 
of  the  intellectual  life — religion,  science,  art ;  that  art  and 
music,  poetry  and  painting,  should  blend  together  to  form 
one  comprehensive  manifestation  of  the  beautiful.  In 
other  words,  the  fundamental  idea  of  German  Romanticism 
_might  be  stated  summarily  in  the  words  :  it  was  an  at- 
tempt to  create  a  harmony  of  intellect  and  heart,  of  life 
and  art,  on  the  basis  of  individualism. 

The  little  school  from  which  these  vital  and  inspiriting 
ideas  emanated  was  formed  in  the  year  1798,  and — of 
all  places — in  the  unromantic  stronghold  of  the  "_Aufkla-  ~- 
rung/'  Berlin.  In  that  year  Ludwig  Tieck,  together  with 
the  two  brothers  Schlegel  and  Friedrich  von  Hardenberg 
("  Novalis  "),  formulated  the  principles  of  the  new  move- 
ment, and~th*e  first  number  of  the  organ  of  the  school^ 
the  Athenanm  (1798-1800),  was  published.  In  the 
summer  of  the  following  year  the  Romantic  School  found 
a  more  congenial  home  in  Jena ;  but  before  long  its 
members  were  again  scattered.  Novalis  died  in  1801, 
and  when,  in  1804,  Tieck  left  Germany  for  a  lengthy 
stavjrj  Italy,  the  Romantic  School,  as  a  school,  had 
virtually  come  to  an  end. 

Johann  Ludwig  Tieck  (iZ2£JJLi3}>  a  native  of  Berlin> 
was  the  youngest  member  of  the  group,  but  he  may  be 
considered  first  as  his  work  shows  most  clearly  the  tran- 

N 


IQ4  THE    ROMANTIC    MOVEMENT. 

sition  from  "Sturm  und  Drang"  to  Romanticism.  Tieck 
began  as  a  belated  imitator  of  the  "Sturmer  und  Dranger"; 
his  first  important  work  was  a  novel,  Geschichte  des  Herrn 
William  LovelJ_  (1795-96),  the  hero  of  which,  akin  in 
temperament  to  Werther  and  Karl  Moor,  follows  that  down- 
ward course  through  guilt  and  crime  which  the  novelists 
of  the  earlier  movement  loved  to  describe.  The  year 
after  William  Lovell  was  completed  Tieck  appeared  in 
a  different  light ;  he  produced  a  satiric  comedy,  Dgr 

"$  gestiefelte  Kater  (1797),  which  ridiculed  unsparingly  the 
moralising  family-comedies  of  Iffland  and  Kotzebue,  into 
which  the  "  domestic  drama  "  of  the  seventies  had  degen- 
erated. So  far,  Tieck's  genius  had  been  mainly  active  in 
a  negative  way,  destroying  the  old  order  of  things;  the 
positive  Romanticist  in  him  was  first  awakened  by  a  former^ 

J^scHool  Triend,  W.  H.  Wackenroder  (1773-98).  Wacken- 
roder,  who  was  cut  off  at  the  early  age  of  twenty-five, 
was  one  of  those  gentle,  retiring  natures  to  whom  the 
Romantic  School  owed  its  most  stimulating  and  revol- 
utionary ideas.  His  Herzensergiessungen  eines  kunstlier 
benden  Klosterbruders  (1797),  an  anonymously  published 
little  book,  to  which  Tieck  contributed  a  few  essays, 

*  contains  the  germ  of  the   Romantic  conception   of  art ; 
art  here  is  not  regarded  analytically  and  critically  as  the 
product  of  ingenious  minds,  but  jis^some thing  divine,  as 
an  expression  of  religious  feeling 4  in  Wackenroder's  eyes 

*  Raphael,    the    painter   of   madonnas,    is    the   greatest    of 
>;^  all    painters.       Similarly   he    pleads  for  music   as   an  art 

^Nio  less  intimately  bound  up  with  our  spiritual  life.  In 
1799,  after  Wackenroder's  death,  Tieck  published  another 
collection  of  essays,  Phantasien  iiber  die  Kunst,  to  which, 
however,  he  himself  contributed  about  half  the  contents ; 
and  to  Wackenroder's  influence  on  Tieck  we  owe  the  first 
characteristically  Romantic  novel,  Franz  Sternbalds  Wan- 
der un  gen  (i_7jjji)..  Tieck  claimed  the  entire  authorship, 

*  but  the  same  inspiration  lies  clearly  behind  the  book  as 
lay  behind  the  Herzensergiessungen.     Franz  Sternbald  is 
a  "  Kiinstlerroman,"  and  owes  much  to  the  fountainhead 
of  the  entire  Romantic  fiction,  Wilhelm  Meister.     It  is  the 


LUDWIG   TIECK.  195 

story  of  a  gifted  pupil  of  Albrecht  Diirer,  who  wanders 
through  Holland  and  Italy,  meeting  companions  and 
adventures  by  the  way.  The  meagre  plot  of  the  story  is 
of  small  interest,  but  its  author's  youthful  de-light  in  nature 
and  reverent  attitude  towards  art  and  artists  are  refreshing 
after  the  feverish  atmosphere  of  William  Lovell.  From 
the  artist-novel  Tieck  passed  to  the  "  Marchen,"  or  fairy- 
taje^.  Uer  blonde  Eckbert^  Die  schone  Mage/one,  Der 
getreue  Eckart,  are  charming  examples  of  the  purely 
Romantic  fairy-tale,  in  which  nature  seems  to  enter 
jrito_a_mystic  relationship  with  human  life.  These  stories 
are  equally  far  removed  from  the  rationalistic  fairy-tales 
of  Musaus  and  the  unvarnished  stories  of  the  people 
collected  at  a  later  period  of  the  Romantic  movement  by 
the  brothers  Grimm. 

But  Tieck's  chief  interest  lay  in  the  drama,  on  which 
as  a  critic  he  TTa3  great  influence,  especially  in  his  later 
years.  His  own  serious  dramas,  notably  Leben  und  Tod 
der  heiligen  Genoveva,  (1799)  and  Kaiser  Oktayiaiius 
(1804),  are  examples  of  the  Romantic  drama  in  its  most 
uncompromising  form  ;  they  arCTyric  iri  the  persistence 
with  which  the  poet  dwells  on  moods  and  feelings,  and 
(•£pT£  in  the  length  and  magnitude  of  their  themes.  There 
is  poetry  in  them,  Romantic,  mediseval,  mystic  —  but 
theTfruejSramatic  note  is  absent ;  the  practical  exigencies 
of  the  stage  are  ignored.  Of  foreign  influences,  that  of 
Calder6n  is  most  conspicuous,  a  poet  whom  the  Roman- 
ticists placed  even  higher  than  Shakespeare.  Between 
1799  and  1 80 1  Tieck  published  a  translation  of  another 
great  Spanish  work,  the  .Don  Quixote  of  Cervantes.  The  year 
1804  formed  a  break  in  Tieck's  life  flrTtLat  year  he  went 
to  Rome,  and  when  he  returned,  two  years  later,  Roman- 
ticism had  entered  upon  a  new  phase.  Tieck  now  settled 
in  Dresden,  and  one  of  his  first  tasks  here  was  to  collect 
the  stories  of  his  earlier  period  and  imbed  them  in  a 
connecting  narrative,  making  them  appear  to  be  told  by  a 
circle  of  friends  ;  this  collection  appeared  under  the  title 
Phartasus  in  1812-16,  and  forms  a  marked  contrast  to  the 
more  realistic,  matter-of-fact  "  Novellen  "  which  he  wrote 


ig6  THE    ROMANTIC    MOVEMENT. 

from  about  1821  on.  Tieck's  work  of  this  period — and 
he  lived  until  the  year  1853 — belongs,  however,  to  a  later 
stage  of  the  Romantic  movement. 

The  greatest  genius  of  the  school  was  Friedrich  von 
Hardenberg,  better  known  by  his  pseudonym  trNovalis7"~ 
(1772-1801).  A  delicate  consumptive,  Hardenberg  was 
neither  mentally  nor  physically  made  for  the  prosaic  world 
of  everyday  ;  the  most  exalted  and  spiritual  of  poets,  he 
was  often  helpless  as  a  child  before  the  common  facts  and 
experiences  of  life.  Abnormally  sensitive  to  impressions, 
his  poetic  genius  was  awakened  by  love  for  a  girl  of 
twelve,  whose  death,  three  years  later,  plunged  him  into 
a  despair  which  found  lyric  expression  in  the  wonderful 
Hymnen  an  die  Nacht  (1800).  In  1799  Novalis  made 
the  acquaintance  of  Tieck,  who  gave  him  the  encouraging 
support  he  needed;  and  under  Tieck's  guidance  his  genius 
rapidly  unfolded.  But  he  had  only  two  years  to  live, 
and  neither  of  the  two  prose  romances  he  has  left  us 
is  finished. 

Die  Lehrlinge  zu  Sais,  the  first  of  these,  has  hardly 
emerged  from  the  shadowy,  embryonic  stage;  it  is  a 
panegyric — pantheistic  and  mystic — on  the  wonders  of 
nature,  the  background  for  a  novel  rather  than  the  actual 
beginnings  of  one.  Heinrich  vonjOfterdingen ,  published  in 
1802,  is,  on  the  other  hand,  the  representative  novel  of 
the  early  Romantic  movementT  "As"  a  story,  it,  to67"moves 
in  a  shadowy,  unreal  world  of  dreams  and  faery,  of  mys- 
ticism and  allegory ;.  its  figures  are  no  creatures  of  flesh 
and  blood,  nor  are  they  intended  to  give  an  impression  of 
reality ;  but  the  book  is  transfused  by  a  subtle,  spiritual, 
poetry,  which  is  to  be  found  in  so  concentrated  a  form  in 
no  other  work  of  German  prose.  Heinrich's  apprenticeship 
to  poetry,  his  initiation  into  its  mysteries  at  the  hands  of 
Klingsohr,  his  tragic  love,  and  his  search  for  that  "  blue 
flower"  in  which  the  Romantic  poets  symbolised  their 
goal,  are  all  merely  the  outward  and  visible  form  in 
which  the  poet  embodied  a  very  real  confession  of  his 
own  spiritual  adventures. 

But   the  Romantic   movement  would   have   made   but 


A.    W.    SCHLEGEL.  Ig7 

indifferent  progress  had  it  relied  alone  on  the  mystic 
allegories  of  its  unworldly  poets  ;  _a_more  solid  basis  for 
progress  was  afforded  by  the  critical  work  of  the  brothers 
Schlegel.  These  two  writers  came  of  a  family  already 
famous  in  German  literary  annals,  for  Lessing's  pre-  ;/ 
djscessor,  Johann  Elias  Schlegel,  was  their  uncle.  August 
Wilhelrn  (1767-1840.  the  elder  of  the  two,  made  a  name 
for  himself  in  Jena  as_a_crjticj  and  in  1797  began  the  pub- 
lication of  what  may  be  regarded  as  the  greatest  achieve- 
ment^ o/  the  first  Romantic  School,  his  translation  of 
Shakespeare.  It  is  hardly  possible  to  overestimate  the 
merit  of  this  masterly  translation,  in  which  Schlegel  was, 
undoubtedly,  Assisted  by  his  wife  Caroline  (1763-1809), 
the  most  gifted  woman  of  the  Romantic  circle.  The 
mastery  lies,  not  in  Schlegel's  verbal  accuracy,  which  is  not 
always  unimpeachable,  but  in  his  power  of  conveying  from 
English  into  German  the  intangible,  indefinable  atmo- 
sphere of  the  Shakespearean  drama,  of  making  Shakespeare 
a  national  poet  of  the  German  people.  Schlegel  trans- 
lated only  seventeen  of  the  plays ;  these,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  Richard  ///.,  which  did  not  appear  until  1810, 
were  published  between  1797  and  1801.  The  remaining 
dramas  were  completed  by  Tieck's  daughter  Dorothea 
^7799-1841)  and  Graf  Wolf  von  Baudissin  (1789-1878), 
and,  it  must  be  added,  in  exceedingly  close  imitation  of 
Schlegel's  example  and  method.  As  an  original  poet, 
Schlegel  published  Gedichte  in  1800,  and  an  ineffective, 
bloodless  Greek  tragedy, ~Ton,  in  1803. 
"""Sclliegel's  reputation  as~a  critic,  especially  after  his  - 
famous  Viennese  lectures__jt/^  dramatische  Kunst  und 
Literal ur  (published  1809-11),  was  European,  and  fiom 
thls~date  on  he  was  generally  recognised  as  the  exponent 
of  the  Romantic  methods  of  criticism.  He  published,  to- 
gether with  his^rother  Fried  rich,  two  volumes  of  collected 
critical  essays  in  1801,  entitled  Charakfenstiken__und 
Kritiken^  This  word  "Charakteristiken"  expresses  perhaps 
better  than  any  definition,  the  distinguishing  feature  ot 
the  Romantic  criticism.  Schlegel  set  up  as  the  first  duty 
of  the  critic,  not  the  passing  of  judgment. on  a  work  of 


198  THE    ROMANTIC    MOVEMENT. 

art,  but  the  appreciative  "  characterisation  "  of  it.     He 

brought  to  bear  on  literature  an  extraordinarily  catholic 
knowledge  and  sympathy  ;  he  taught  his  countrymen  how 
to  appreciate  poets  and  books  far  removed  from  them  in 
space  or  time  ;  for  he  had  himself  the  power,  which  made 
him  so  brilliant  a  translator  of  Shakespeare  and  Calder6n, 
of  putting  himself  at  the  standpoint  of  contemporaries  of 
the  poets  whom  he  criticised. 

Schlegel's  later  life  was  somewhat  chequered  ;  for  a. 
time  tutor  to  the  sons  of  Madame  de  Stae'l,  he  had 
ji  _  direct  influence  on  that  writer's  monumental  work, 
De  rAl/emagne,  which  in  1817  did  so  much  to  make 
German  literature,  and  more  especially  German  Roman- 
tic ideas,  a  force  in  Europe.  From  1818  on  Schlegel 
was  professor  in  the  University  of  Bonn,  where  he 
devoted  himself  mainly  to  oriental  studies.  He  died 
in  1845. 

JjYiedrich  Schlegel  ^1772-1829)  was  also  a  critic,  but 
he  was  the  complement  rather  than  the  rival  of  his 
brother.  In  the  art  of  lucid  interpretation  he  was  his 
brother's  inferior  ;  but  he  had  a  more  original  mind  and 
an  even  wider  outlook  upon  literature.  He  was  particu- 
larly attracted  by  what  we  should  now  call  comparative 
literature,  by  questions  of  aesthetics  and^of  the  relations  of 
poetry  to  life  and  art.  His  early  studies  were  devoted  to 
ThlT  classics^  and  his  first  important  book,  Die  Griechen  und 
Romer  (1^97),  was  clearly  influenced  by  Schiller's  ideas 
on  classic  and  modern  literature.  ^n^fa^Fragmente 
which  he  contributed  to  the  Athendum,  he  formulated 
in  brilliant  aphorisms  the  principles  of  the  Romantic 
School.  Like  his  brother,  he  turned  in  later  life  to 
oriental  studies,  and  his  work  Uber  die  Sprache 


_ 

heit  der  Indier  (1808)  helped  to  lay  the  foundation  for 
modern  oriental  studies.  As  a  creative  writer,  Friedrich 
Schlegel  is  mainly  remembered  by  a  fragmentary  novel, 
Lucinde,  which  appeared  in  1799.  Crude  almost  to  un- 
readableness,  Lucinde  is  a  product  of  the  Romantic  ethical 
theory  ;  it  is  an  attempt  to  introduce  those  theories  of  indi- 
vidual freedom  which  were  part  of  the  Romantic  creed,  into 


ROMANTICISM    IN    PHILOSOPHY    AND    RELIGION.       igg 

the  ordinary  relations  of  everyday  life.  But  what  to  the 
best  of  Schlegel's  contemporaries  appeared  as  a  serious 
contribution  to  social  theory,  reads  now  only  as  an  impeach- 
ment of  Romantic  immorality  and  extravagance.  More 
pleasing  is  the  unfinished  romance,  Florentin  (1801), 
written  by  Friedrich  Schlegel's  wife,  Dorothea  (1763-1839), 
who  was  a  daughter  of  the  philosopher  Moses  Mendelssohn, 
and,  like  her  sister-in-law  Caroline,  one  of  the  brilliant 
women  of  the  Romantic  circle. 

Romanticism,  in  so  far  as  it  sought  to  vitalise  poetry  by 
bringing  it  into  touch  with  art  and  thought  and  life,  was 
thus  far  from  being  purely  a  literary  movement  ;  it  was, 
above  all,  a  power  ig_Pjhilosgphiy  and_religion.  In  its 
philosophy  it  pwedjrmch,  no  doubt,  to  the  great  thinker 
of  the  transition  period,  Fichte,  but  the  chief  exponent_ 
of  Romantic  metaphysics.^was  F.  W.  J.  von  Schelling 
(1775-1854).  The  Romantic  poets  found  in  Schelling's 
writings  an  echo  of  their  own  attitude  towards  nature  ; 
and  the  spiritualisation  of  nature^  which  is  so  constant 
a  feature  in  the  writings  of  Tjeck  and  Novalis,  became  in 
Schelling's  hands  a  philosophical  dogma.  No  less  sym- 
pathetic to  the  Romanticists  was  the  mysticism  which 
arose  out  of  Schelling's  glorification  of  art  as  the  perfect 
union  of  nature  and  spirit  in  the  '.'  WgliggeleJ'  And  what 
ISchelling  did  for  the  philosophy  of  Romanticism,  F.  E.  D. 
Schleiermacher  (1768-1834),  who  was  for  a  time  preacher 
in  Berlin,  and  subsequently  professor  in  Halle,  did  for  its 
religiojD.  But  while  Schelling's  work  was  only  too  soon 
eclipsed  by  the  philosophy  of  Hegel,  Schleiermacher's 
spiritualisation  of  the  dogmatic  systems  of  the  theologians 
had  a  long-lasting  influence  on  the  religious  life  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  His  two  little  volumes,  Reden  itber 
die  Religion  (1799)  and  Monologen  (1800),  helped  materi- 
ally to  discredit  the  "  Aufkla.ru  ng"  and  to  establish  German 
religious  thinking,  catholic  as  well  as  protestant,  on  a  new 
and  healthier  basis  in  which  metaphysics  had  no  part. 
It  was  not  Schleiermacher's  fault  that  the  poets  of  the 
time  chiefly  employed  his  ideas  to  further  a  revival  of 
mediaeval  Catholicism. 


JAA 


•f          f    ' 

'.    r,    „    V.      - 


2OO  THE    ROMANTIC    MOVEMENT. 

The  very  brief  life  of  the  first  Romantic  School  showed 
that,  fruitful  and  germinating  as  its  ideas  were,  it  failed 
to  adapt  itself  to  the  practical  needs  of  the  German 
people ;  and  its  mediaeval  and  catholic  tendencies  only 
emphasised  its  exclusiveness.  It  was  not  to  this  school, 
but  to  a  later  group  of  writers,  associated  with  Heidelberg, 
that  we  owe  the  identification  of  Romanticism  with  the 
national  ideals.  It  is  true,  these  younger  Romanticists, 
Brentano,  Arnim,  Gorres,  also  loved  the  Middle  Ages^ 
and  their  poetic  work  was  distinctly  anti-protestant  in  its 
tendencies  ;  butj±>ey  had  the  art,  whicli  their  predecessors 
lacked,  of  bringing  their  ideas  into  vital  relations  with 
the  time.  Their  conception  of  poetry  was  wide  enough 
to  embrace  the  German  peasant  and  his  Yolkslieder, 
and  actual  enough  to  identify  Romanticism  with  German 
patriotism. 

Clemens  Maria  Brentano^iyyS- 1842),  whose  father 
was  an  Italian,  spurned  with  Romantic  fervour  the  com- 
mercial career  for  which  he  was  destined.  He  became  a 
student  at  Jena,  where,  intoxicated  with  the  new  faith,  he 
spent  the  next  few  years  realising  the  Romantic  ideals  in 
his  own  life.  The  literary  result  was  a  strange,  unbalanced 
novel,  Godwi  (1801),  in  which  the  motives  of  the  older 
Romantic  School,  as  they  had  appeared  in  books  like 
William  Lovell  and  Lucinde,  are  reproduced  in  incongruous 
connections,  the  story  being  interspersed  with  spngs_and_ 
ballads  in  imitation  of  the  Volkslied.  In  1803  Brentano 
married  and  a  year  later  settled  in  Heidelberg,  where  he 
was  soon  joined  by  Ludwig  Achim  von  Arnim  (1781-1 83 1). 
Arnim  was  a  North  German,  a  native  of  Berlin,  and  in 
every  respect  a  contrast  to  Brentano.  Stolid  and  serious, 
his  youth  had  been  uninfluenced  by  the  irresponsible 
Romanticism  of  the  time,  and  was  spent  in  the  study  of 
natural  science.  He  turned  to  literature  comparatively 
late,  and  began  by  writing  novels  and  sketches,  in  which 
he  showed  skill  and  originality  in  utilising  in  a  Romantic 
way  the  experiences  he  had  gathered  on  his  travels,  which 
had  extended  as  far  as  Scotland ;  in  this  respect  "A'rnim  is 
not  unworthy  to  be  regarded  as  a  German  precursor  of 


THE    HEIDELBERG    GROUP.  2OI 

Sir  Walter  Scott.  His  first  ambitious  work,  Hollins 
Liebeleben^  appeared  in  1802;  it  was  subsequently  in- 
corporated in  Grafin  Dolores,  which  is,  on  the  whole, 
the  most  interesting  novel  he  produced  during  his  stay- 
in  Heidelberg. 

The  third  of  the  little  group  of  Heidelberg  Romanti- 
cists, J.  J.  von  jjorres-  (1776-1848),  was  a  thinker  and 
scholar  of  stimulating,  suggestive  ideas  rather  than  a  poet. 
Thejectures.he  held  at  Heidelberg  in  the  years  1806  to 
1808  provided  a  theoretical  background  for  the  new 
Development  of  Romanticism.  It  is  significant  that  this 
'phase  of  the  movement  was  associated  not  merely  with 
the  romantic  town  of  Heidelberg,  but  also  with  its 
university.  The  Romantic  ideas  were  now  beginning  to 
influence  academic  learning ;  and  the  revival  of  scholar- 
ship— and  more  especially  of  philological  scholarship—  at 
the  German  universities  was  intimately  bound  up  with 
the  literary  movement. 

As  the  older  School  had,  as  its  literary  organ,  the 
Athenaum,  so  the  younger  Heidelberg  group  had  its 
Zeitung  fur  Einsiedler(i&o£),  or,  as  it  was  later  called, 
Trosteinsamkeit :  and  this  journal,  short:lived  as  it  was, 
won  new  friends  and  adherents  for  the  movement  all  over 
Germany.  The  chief  work  we  owe  to  the  Heidelberg 
School  is  the  collection  of  Volkslieder  edited  by  Arm'm  and 
TJfentanb  in  1805  and  1808,  under  the  title  Des  Knaben 
^iVuriderhorn.  Herder,  it  will  be  remembered,  had,  on 
the  model  of  the  Percy  Ballads,  made  the  first  modern 
collection  of  Volkslieder  in  Germany,  but  Herder's  collec- 
tion was  only  to  a  limited  extent  German  ;  he  rather 
prided  himself  on  his  cosmopolitanism  in  gathering 
examples  of  popular  song  from  the  remotest  quarters  of 
Europe.  Des  Knaben  Wunderhorn,  on  the  other  hand, 
is  purely  national  and  German.  Neither  Rrentano  nor 
Arnim  had  lyric  talent  of  the  first  order,  but  they  both 
possessed  that  passivity  of  artistic  temperament  which 
reflects  and  reproduces  impressions  with  accuracy  ;  they 
had — and  this,  in  spite  of  the  accusation  that  lias  been 
brought  against  them,  that  they  tampered  unduly  with 


202  THE    ROMANTIC    MOVEMENT. 

the  texts  of  their  Volkslieder — the  power  of  reproducing 
not  merely  the  words  of  these  popular  songs,  but  also 
their  peculiar  atmosphere.  Des  Knaben  Wunderhorn  has 
become  Germany's  greatest  song-book,  and  its  influence 
may  be  followed  on  the  entire  German  lyric  of  the 
nineteenth  century. 

No  less  important  was  the  activity  of  the  school  in 

other  fields  of  popular  literature.  In  1807 Gorres 

published  his  collection  of  Die  teutschen  Volksbiicher^  and 
SvU~w^  irTi'8^2-15  tne  brothers  Grimm  their  Kinder-  und  Haus- 

mdrchen^  followed  in  1816-18  by  Deutsche  Sagen.  Here 
the  method  of  the  Wunderhorn  was  transferred  to  the 
stories  of  the  people,  and  of  these  three  collections, 
Grimm's  fairy  -  tales,  at  least,  have  become  an  abiding 
possession  of  the  German  people.  If  the  translation  of 
Shakespeare  is  to  be  called  the  crowning  achievement  of 
the  first  Romantic  School,  Des  Knaben  Wunderhorn  and 
Grimm's  Mdrchen  are  assuredly  those  of  the  second. 
Jgtotk  (1785-1863)  and  Wilhelm  Grimm_(i786-  i8so). 
both  natives  of  Hanau,  were  the  founders  of  modern 
German  philology  as  a  science.  With  Jakob  Grimm  s 
Deutsche  Grammatik  (1819-37),  Deutsche  Rechtsaltertiimer 
(1828),  and  Deutsche  Mythologie  (1835),  above  all,  with 
the  monumental  Deutsches  Worterbuch,  begun  by  both 
brothers  together  in  1852,  and  still  unfinished,  a  solid 
basis  was  laid  for  the  study  of  the  German  language 
and  the  German  past. 

Meanwhile,  however,  the  Romantic  circle  in  Heidel- 
berg had  become  scattered ;  Arnirn  and  Brentano  both 
left  Heidelberg  in  1808  and  settled  in  Berlin,  where, 
together  with  a  number  of  new  writers,  notably .Fpuque, 
^hamisso,  and  Eichendorff,  they  inaugurated  a  third 
stage  in  the  development  of  the  Romantic  movement. 
As  far  as  original  work  was  concerned,  this  third  period 
of  Romanticism  was  more  productive  than  either  of  its 
predecessors.  Arnim  has  left  a  number  of  dramas  which 
contain  a  wealth  of  imaginative  poetry,  but  are  even  less 
suited  for  the  stage  than  Tieck's ;  his  novels,  however, 
have  real  and  abiding  worth.  Armut,  Reichtum,  Schuld 


ARNIM    AND    BRENTANO    IN    BERLIN.  203 

und  Busse  der  Grtifin  Dolores  (1809),  Isabella  von 
Agypten  (1812),  and  especially  the  admirable  historical 
novel,  Die  Kronenwachter,  of  which  a  fragment  consisting 
of  only  two  books  was  published  in  1817,  are  good  ex- 
amples of  Arnim's  powers  as  a  novelist.  His  strength  lies 
in  his  narrative  style ;  he  has  something  of  that  peculiar 
power  of  holding  the  reader's  attention  by  picturesque 
presentment,  which  Scott  possessed  in  so  high  a 
degree  ;  on  the  other  hand,  the  stories  themselves 
suffer  from  the  Romantic  lack  of  dramatic  concen- 
tration. A  more  magnificent  theme  than  that  of  Die 
Kronenwachter  would  be  hard  to  find.  The  "  crown 
guardians"  are  a  mysterious  society  which  seeks  out 
descendants  of  the  Hohenstaufen  dynasty,  so  dear  to  all 
Romantic  souls,  that  these  may  one  day  revive  the  glories 
of  the  German  Empire.  The  story  takes  place  in  the 
sixteenth  century,  and  historical  figures,  like  Maximilian, 
Luther,  Faust,  cross  Arnim's  pages.  But  admirably 
imagined  as  all  this  is,  the  actual  happenings  fail  to  grip 
us  as  in  a  writer  with  a  firmer  hold  on  reality  they  could 
hardly  have  failed  to  do.  In  1811  Arnim  married 
Brentanp's  sister  Bettina,  whose  correspondence  with 
Goethe  has  already  been  mentioned.  Bettina  von  Arnim 
was  one  of  the  many  gifted  women  of  the  Romantic 
circle,  but  as  she  published  nothing  until  after  her 
husband's  death  in  1831,  her  work  may  more  conveniently 
be  dealt  with  in  a  subsequent  chapter. 

Amongst  Brentano's  other  writings  two  short  stories, 
Geschichte  vom  braven  Kasperl  und  dem  schonen  Annerl 
(1817),  and  the  oriental  fairy-tale,  Gockel,  Hinkel  und 
Gackeleia  (1838),  are  still  popular.  His  Romanzen  vom 
Rosenkranz  (1852)  is  an  allegorical  poem,  or  collection 
of  poems,  on  episodes  from  the  poet's  own  life  and  those 
of  his  friends.  Reality  is  here  blended  with  catholic  legend 
and  with  motives  from  Dante,  the  whole  making  the 
impression  of  some  pre-Raphaelite  mosaic ;  we  marvel  at 
its  sustained  power  and  beauty  ;  but  it  is  too  artificially 
archaic  to  have  much  meaning  for  the  modern  world.  The 
same  is  true  of  Brentano's  long  dramatic  version  of  the 


204  THE    ROMANTIC    MOVEMENT. 

saga  of  Libussa,  Die  Grilndung  Prags  (1815).  Here 
again  there  is  no  questioning  Brentano's  mastery  of  the 
art  of  verse  ;  there  are  wonderful  scenes  in  this  play,  such 
as  only  the  untheatrical  dramatists  of  Romanticism  could 
conceive,  scenes  in  which  the  workings  of  the  soul  are, 
as  it  were,  projected  on  the  screen  of  nature.  But,  in 
spite  of  all  this,  Die  Grilndung  Prags  has  meant  as  little 
for  the  history  of  dramatic  literature  as  any  other  of  the 
uncompromising  dramas  of  the  Romanticists.  Brentano's 
Catholicism  narrowed  as  he  grew  older ;  he  became,  if 
not  a  fanatic  for  his  faith,  yet  so  thoroughly  immersed  in 
catholic  mysticism  as  to  lose  all  touch  with  the  outside 
world.  Long  before  he  died  in  1842  he  had  ceased  to 
be  a  force  in  German  literature. 

_The  lyric  genius  of  the  circle  of  Berlin  Romanticists 
was  a  young  French  nobleman,  L.  C.  A.  de  Chamisso,1 
known  to  German  literature  as  Adelbert  von  Chamisso 
(1781-1838).  Chamisso,  whose  family  had  fled  from 
Champagne  at  the  Revolution,  had  scientific  interests,  and 
between  1815  and  1818  he  made  a  voyage  round  the 
world ;  on  his  return  he  was  appointed  curator  of  the 
Royal  Botanical  collections  in  Berlin.  He  had  contri- 
buted poems  to  Berlin  almanachs  early  in  the  century, 
but  his  first  collected  edition  of  Gedichte  did  not  appear 
until  1831.  It  is  one  of  the  freaks  of  literary  history 
that  this  French  aristocrat  should  have  become  one  of 
the  most  German  of  German  poets ;  his  gentle  senti- 
mentality, his  delight  in  the  simple  joys  of  the  people, 
have  made  many  of  his  songs,  such  as  the  cycle 
Frauenliebe  imd  Leben  (1831),  genuine  Volkslieder ;  and 
.his  ballads  (Die  Giftmischerin,  1828;  Die  Lowenbraut, 
1829;  Salas  y  Gomez,  1830;  Mateo  Falcone,  1830),  al- 
though lacking  in  the  dramatic  notes  of  a  Schiller  or 
Uhland,  have  all  the  high  lights  of  Romanticism.  Cha- 
misso is  also  the  author  of  one  of_the  most  popular_tale_s_ 
of  the  century^  Peter  Schlemthls  wundersame  Geschichte 
(1814),  the  story  of  the  man  who  sells  his  shadow  to 
the  devil  and  gets  into  all  kinds  of  difficulties  owing  to 
the  want  of  it.  The  simplicity  of  Chamisso's  artless 


EICHENDORFF.  205 

narrative,  combined,  as  it  is,  with  realistic  touches,  reminds 
one  at  times  of  the  great  Danish  fairy-tale  writer,  H.  C. 
Andersen. 

The  chief  lyric  singer  of  this  third  phase  of  Romanti- 
cism was  hardly  associated  personally  with  the  Berlin 
circle.  Joseph  von  Eichendorff  (1788-1857)  was  a 
Silesiaiij  whose  poetic  genius  had  been  kindled  in  1  lddi.:l- 
l^erg.  He  served  as  a  soldier  in  the  War  of  Liberation,  and 
when  the  war  was  over,  entered  the  government  service, 
rising  rapidly  to  high  and  responsible  positions  in  Danzig, 
Konigsberg,  and  Berlin.  He  retired  from  the  public 
service  in  1845  and  died  in  1857.  In  his  lyric  poetry 
(Gcdichte,  1837)  Eichendorff  is  to  be  seen  at  his  best.  His 
range  of  expression  is  not  as  wide  as  Goethe's  or  Heine's, 
but  within  its  limitations  it  is  perfect.  He  is,  like  all 
the  Romantic  lyric  poets,  esse_nntially_ji  poet  of  nature^ 
and  he  possesses  in  a  peculiar  degree  the  art  of  attuning 
human  emotions  to  nature's  moods  ;  he  is  the  poet  of 
the  German  forest,  whose  magic  voices  sang  round 
his  cradle  and  accompanied  him  all  through  his  life. 
Eichendorffs  dramatic  attempts  were  ineffective,  and  his 
literary  criticism  (Die  neue  romantische  Poesie  in  Deutsch- 
land,  1847)  was  coloured  by  his  Catholicism.  But  as  a 
novelist  he  occupies  a  position  _of  somejmportance.  His 
first  novel,  Ahnung  und  Gegenwart  (1815),  stands  in  the 
direct  line  of  the  evolution  of  the  Romantic  novel  from 
Wilhelm  Meister  as  starting-point ;  but,  as  with  most  of 
the  Romantic  novels,  the  achievement  falls  considerably 
short  of  the  intention.  Ahnung  und  Gegenwart  is  more 
a  record  of  subjective  emotions  and  moods  than  a  novel  ; 
it  has  little  construction  of  any  kind  and  hardly  any 
connecting  thread.  A  second  novel,  Dichter  und  ihre 
Gesellen  (1834).  has  even  less  homogeneity.  On  the 
other  hand,  Eichendorff  has  left  one  masterpiece  as  a 
prose  writer,  in  the  little  story,  Aus  dem  Leben  eines 
Taugenichts  (1826),  one  of  the  gems  of  Romantic  fiction. 
A~story  it  hardly  is,  being  merely  the  description  of  a 
young  musician's  romantic  wanderings ;  but  into  this 
little  book  Eichendorff  poured  all  the  poetry  of  his- 


2O6  THE    ROMANTIC    MOVEMENT. 

own  inimitable  Wanderlieder,  his  dreamy  delight  in 
nature  and  his  yearning  for  Italy,  that  goal  of  all 
Romantic  souls. 

To  the  three  centres  of  Romantic  activity,_Jena, 
Heidelberg,  and  Berlin,  might  be  added  a  fourth,  Dresden.^ 
We  can  hardly  speak  of  a  Dresden  "  school,"  but  the 
-  4  chief  dramatist  of  the  age,  Jileist,  was  for  a  brief  period 
of  his  career  associated  with  this  town.  In  the  editing  of 
his  journal  Phobus,  which  he  published  here,  Kleist  was 
assisted  by  Adam  H.  Miiller  (1779-1829),  who,  together 

,,  with  his  friend  Friedrich  von  Gentz  (1764-1832),  illustrates 
c.p  the  reactionary  influence  of  the  early  Romantic  movement, 

\  when  applied   to   the   sphere  of  practical  politics ;   both 

v-these   men   entered   the   service   of  Austria  and  became 
apologists  of  the  Metternich  regime.     The  same  tendency 

v  in  Romanticism  which  led  back  to  the  catholic  church, 
'  ^o  tended  to  a  suppression  of  liberal  ideas  in  politics  and  a 
3  return  to  absolutism. 

Before  leaving  this  period  of  Romantic  ascendancy,  we 
have  to  consider  a  group  of  poets  who,  although  not  con- 
nected immediately  with  any  of  the  schools  or  centres, 
yet  supplemented  the  patriotic  ideals  of  the  Heidelberg 
writers.  These  are  the  poets  of  the  "  Befreiungskrieg," 
the  young  singers  who  inspired  and  celebrated  Germany's 
national  rising  against  Napoleon.  Chief  among  these 
were  three  :  Korner,  Arndt,  and  Schenkendorf. 

Karl  Theodor  Korner  (1791-1813)  was  a  son  of 
Schiller's  best  friend,  and  the  most  precocious  of  the  three. 
Any  other  form  of  comparison  is  difficult,  for  Korner 
died  a  soldier's  death  as  a  member  of  Liitzow's  volunteer 
corps  at  the  age  of  twenty-three.  And  yet,  young  as  he 
was,  he  had  already  written  a  number  of  dramas  in  the 
manner  of  Schiller  and  of  Kotzebue  ;  the  best  of  these, 
Zriny  (1812),  has,  however,  more  of  Schiller's  rhetoric 
than  his  poetry.  In  1814,  after  his  death,  his  father 
published  his  patriotic  war  songs  under  the  title  Leier  und 
Schwert.  It  is  always  difficult  for  a  later  generation  to 
appreciate  the  patriotic  lyric  called  forth  by  a  special  event 
or  circumstance,  and  it  is  particularly  difficult  in  the  present 


THE    PATRIOTIC    LYRIC.  207 

case  to  understand  the  enthusiasm  which  Korner's  songs 
evoked.  One  might  again  say  of  them  what  Lessing  said 
of  Gleim's  patriotic  lyric  :  the  patriot's  voice  has  drowned 
(the jooet^sj  and  doubtless  the  heroic  career  of  the  young 
soldier  was  an  important  factor  in  the  popularity  of  his 
songs.  Ernst  Moritz  Arndt_(i  769-1860)  has  greater  claims 
for  serious  consideration  in  a  history  of  literature ;  he 
was  an  older  and  maturer  man  in  1813.  His  poems  ap- 
peared in  a  collected  edition  in  1818.  As  a  patriotic 
singer  he  renewed,  we  might  say,  the  protestant  war  song 
of  the  Thirty  Years'  War — that  is  to  say,  he  combined 
the  best  traditions  of  the  German  Volkslied  with  the 
sturdy  protestantism  of  Luther  ;  to  him  patriotism  and 
protestantism  were  one ;  his  nature  was  at  bottom  deeply 
religious.  As  a  prose  writer  Arndt  is  equally  important. 
His  work  on  the  Napoleonic  era,  Der  Geist  der  Zeit  (1806- 
18),  is  an  invaluable  document  of  the  time,  laying  bare 
the  hidden  springs  of  the  national  rising,  a  rising  which 
was  not  merely  a  revolt  against  a  foreign  oppressor, 
but  also  the  vindication  of  the  German  nation  as  a 
nation.  Less  immediately  stimulating  than  either  Korner 
or  Arndt,  Maximilian  von  jSslmnkendprf  (1783-1817)  was 
a  more  gifted  lyric  poet  than  either.  He  had  more,  too, 
of  the  historic  sense  of  the  Romanticists  ;  he  looked  back 
to  the  mediaeval  glories  of  the  old  Roman  Empire  as  well 
as  forward  to  a  new,  united  German  empire.  He  was 
Romantic,  too,  in  so  far  as  he  brought  the  poetry  of 
medievalism  into  the  service  of  patriotism. 

These  three  men  were  the  chief  patriotic  poets  or 
1813;  but  there  were  many  others,  such  as  I'Yiedrirh 
Riickert  and  Hoffmann  von  Fallersleben,  who,  although 
their  real  work  belongs  to  a  later  epoch,  began  their  careers 
amidst  the  enthusiasm  of  this  year.  jt_8i3  was,  in  fact, 
a  year  of  the  greatest  significance  for  the  history  of 
Romanticism ;  for  it  marked  the  triumph  of  that  national 
and  patriotic  movement  which  had  been  initiated  by  the 
Heidelberg  school ;  but  it  alsojbrmed  the  starting-point 
fora  new  development,  realistic  and  modern,  which,  as 
the  years  moved  on,  had  less  and  less  to  say  to  the 


-Vo, 


2O8  THE    ROMANTIC    MOVEMENT. 

unworldly  idealism  of  Romanticism.  The  decay  of  Rom- 
anticism as  a  literary  force  began  with  the  fall  of  Napoleon, 
not  because  that  movement  was  indifferent  or  antagonistic 
to  the  national  triumph,  which  it  certainly  was  not ;  but 
because  the  growing  self-  confidence  of  the  German 
people  brought  with  it  more  pressing  practical  interests 
and  duties,  and  these  inevitably  pressed  the  old  Roman- 
tic dreams  into  the  background. 


209 


CHAPTER  XIX. 

THE  DRAMA  UNDER  ROMANTIC  INFLUENCE. 

NOTWITHSTANDING  the  fact  that  the  first  Romantic  School 
had  translated  and  interpreted  Shakespeare,  that  the  poet 
to  whom  they  gave  the  first  place,  Calderdn,  was  a  drama- 
tist, and  that  the  Romantic  critics  busied  themselves  in- 
cessantly with  the  theatre,  they  produced  no  great,  or  even 
£minejntj_drarnatic  poet :  the  drama  of  the  School  might 
never  have  been  written  and  German  literature  would  not 
have  been  appreciably  the  poorer ;  certainly  the  German 
stage  would  not.  The  dramatists  who  put  their  stamp 
upon  the  Romantic  age  all  stood  outside  the  Romantic 
coteries  ;  they  had  no  belief  in  Tieck's  or  Brentano's  im- 
practicable ideals  of  a  non-theatrical  drama ;  and  were 
obliged  by  the  very  nature  of  their  craft  to  keep  in  touch 
with  the  stage.  Not  the  Romantic  drama,  but  the  drama 
under  Romantic  influence,  was  the  dominating  force  in  the 
theatre  of  the  nineteenth  century.  Schiller  himself,  as 
we  have  seen,  had  written  Romantic  plays,  the  greatest 
of  all  Romantic  tragedies,  the  first  part  of  Goethe's  Faust 
appeared  in  1808,  and  the  entire  dramatic  production  of 
Germany  from  Kleist  to  Hebbel  and  Ludwig  stood  under 
Romantic  influence. 

Zacharias  Werner  (1768-1823)  was,  of  all  the  drama- 
Jjsts  now  to  be  considered,  most  deeply  mjrflfrsed  in  the 
Romantic  stream.  He  was  born  at  Konigsberg  and, 
after  a  dissolute  and  unsettled  life,  ended  his  days  as  a 
priest  and  popular  preacher  in  Vienna.  He  had  already 
attracted  attention  as  a  playwright  before  Schiller's  death, 

o 


2IO      THE    DRAMA    UNDER    ROMANTIC    INFLUENCE. 

with  a  strange  Romantic  play,  Die  Sohne  des  Tales,  in 
two  parts,  entitled  respectively,  Die  Templer  auf  Cypern 
and  Die  Kreuzesbriider  (1803).  The  subject  is  the 
fall  of  the  order  of  the  Templars  and  the  establish- 
ment of  a  new  order  of  "  sons  of  the  valley "  in  their 
place ;  it  afforded  Werner  an  opportunity  for  displaying 
that  combination  of  religious  fervour  and  theatrical 
mysticism  in  which  he  revelled.  His  second  play^Das 
Kreuz  an  der  Ostsee  (1806),  is  dramatically  an  advance 
on  his  first ;  it  is,  moreover,  patriotic  as  well  as  historical ; 
for  Werner,  with  all  his  Romanticism,  was  keenly  sensi- 
tive to  the  humiliation  of  his  country  under  Napoleon. 
Das  Kreuz  an  der  Ostsee — its  theme  is  the  struggle  of 
the  Teutonic  Knights  against  the  Slavs — was  planned 
as  the  first  of  a  cycle  of  patriotic  dramas  drawn  from 
Prussian  history.  Werner's  next  play  leapt  over  centuries, 
to  the  Reformation  ;  Martin  Luther,  oder  die  Weihe  der 
Kraft  (1807),  had  the  greatest  success  of  all  his  dramas, 
a  success  which,  a  few  years  later,  when  Werner  became 
a  convert  to  Catholicism,  he  regretted.  More  significant, 
however,  was  a  little  one -act  tragedy,  Der  vierund- 
zwanzigste  Februar  (performed  1810,  published  1815), 
which  shows  an  extraordinary  command  of  weird  effects. 
It  forms  the  connecting  link  between  Schiller's  Braut  von 
Messina  and  the  "  Schicksalstragodien,"  or  "  fate  tragedies," 
in  which  a  curse  or  fate  overhanging  the  characters  is  asso- 
ciated with  a  definite  day  and  a  fatal  weapon. 

The  chief  "fate  dramatist'"  was  Adolf  Milliner  (1774- 
1829),  who  was  an  advocate  by  profession.  In  1812  he 
produced  Der  neunundvierzigste  Februar,  an  imitation  of 
Werner's  play,  in  which,  however,  there  is  more  theatrical 
than  tragic  effect.  A  year  later  appeared  at  Vienna 
his  typical  "fate  drama,"  Die  Schuhl,  which  for  a  time 
was  exceedingly  popular  in  all  German  theatres.  Die 
Schuld  is  not  without  gleams  of  poetry  of  a  kind,  but 
the  impression  it  makes  is  rather  that  of  a  skilfully  con- 
structed criminal  melodrama.  A  young  Spaniard,  who, 
according  to  a  prophecy,  is  to  kill  his  brother,  is  brought 
up  in  the  north  of  Europe,  but  returns  to  his  native  land  ; 


MttLLNER    AND    KLEIST.  211 

to  win  the  woman  he  loves,  he  kills  her  husband  on  a 
hunting  expedition,  and  the  dead  man  turns  out  to  be 
his  own  brother.  Die  Schuld  is  written  in  the  trochaic 
measure  of  the  Spanish  drama,  a  measure  which  Grillparzer 
employed  with  wonderful  effect  in  the  greatest  of  all  the 
"fate  tragedies,"  Die  Ahnfrau  (1817).  Milliner  wrote 
other  plays  and  was  for  a  time  an  influential  journalist ; 
but  he  had  exhausted  all  that  he  had  to  say  to  his  age  as 
a  poet  in  Die  Schuld,  and  from  that  tragedy  the  later  "  fate 
dramatists  "  borrow  freely.  The  general  tendency,  how- 
ever, as  is  to  be  seen  from  such  plays  as  Der  Leuchtturm 
(1821)  and  Das  Bild  (1821)  by  C.  E.  von  Houwald 
(1778-1845),  was  to  sentimentalise  the  tragic  motives 
and  adapt  them  to  the  shallow  theatrical  purposes  of 
Kotzebue. 

The  first  master  of  the  drama  in  the  period  after  Schiller's 
death  was  Heinrich  von  Kleist,  who  was  born  at  Frank- 
fort-on-the-Oder  on  October  18,  1777.  He  came  of  a 
military  family,  and  was  brought  up  amidst  military  sur- 
roundings that  were  distasteful  to  him :  he  wandered 
restlessly  first  to  Paris,  then  to  Switzerland.  Even  when 
he  was  fairly  launched  on  a  literary  career  and  had  gained 
confidence  in  his  genius,  his  work  met  with  no  general 
recognition  ;  Goethe,  in  what  was  the  one  serious  mis- 
judgment  of  his  life,  saw  in  him  only  a  poet  of  mediocre 
talent.  Life  remained  to  the  end  an  insoluble  riddle  to 
Kleist;  he  was  torn  asunder  by  unhappy  love-affairs,  and 
Tn  November  181 1  he  put  an  end  to  his  life  on  the  shore  of 
the  Wannsee  near  Berlin.  Under  these  circumstances  it 
is  not  surprising  that  the  work  he  has  left  us  should  con- 
trast strangely  with  the  classic  poetry  of  Weimar.  He 
began  with  a  turbulent,  unbalanced  tragedy,  Die  Familie 
Schroffenstein  (1803),  which,  were  it  not  for  an  infusion 
of  distinctly  Romantic  ideas,  might  have  come  straight 
from  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang "  of  the  previous  genera- 
tion. Amphitryon  (1807),  again,  is  a  Romantic  adaptation 
of  Moliere's  play  of  that  name  ;  Penthesilea  (1808),  a  lurid 
tragedy  of  the  Homeric  age,  in  which  love,  hate,  and  scorn 
are  projected  as  on  a  screen  in  superhuman  proportions. 


212       THE    DRAMA    UNDER    ROMANTIC    INFLUENCE. 

The  dramas  that  followed  were  less  stormy.  jDer 
zerbrochene  Krug  (1808,  published  1811),  a  one -act 
comedy  centring  in  a  village  trial  over  a  broken  jar,  is  a 
masterpiece  of  its  kind,  one  of  the  few  German  comedies 
of  the  first  rank.  Das  Kathchen  von  Heilbronn,  oder 
die  Feuerprobe  (1810),  is  a  bustling  Romantic  drama, 
recalling  the  "  Ritterdramen  "  which  originated  with  Gb'tz 
von  Berlichingen.  But  the  mediaevalism  of  Kleist's  play 
is,  again,  unmistakably  Romantic,  and  not  of  the  "  Sturm 
und  Drang";  the  love  which  inspires  his  Kathchen  to 
follow  the  Ritter  vom  Strahl  is  more  akin  to  that  of 
Goethe's  Mignon  than  of  his  Maria.  The  plot  of  the 
play  is  inept  and  even  absurd  ;  it  is  not  even  as  good 
as  that  of  many  of  the  despised  "  Ritterromane "  ;  but 
its  crudities  are  atoned  for  and  ennobled  by  the  wealth 
of  poetry  with  which  Kleist  has  surrounded  it.  Die 
Hermanns schlacht  (1808,  not  published  till  1821)  is, 
again,  a  tragedy  in  Kleist's  intense  manner  ;  its  theme, 
the  heroic  struggles  of  the  Germans  under  Arminius 
against  the  Roman  legions  at  the  dawn  of  German 
history,  serves,  however,  only  as  a  cloak  for  Kleist's 
patriotic  hatred  of  the  French  oppressor  of  Germany. 
His  dramatic  masterpiece  is  J)cr  Prinz  von  Homburg 
(rSio,  first  published  1821).  This  historical  drama, 
in  which  history  is  perhaps  made  unduly  subservient 
to  poetry,  sets  out  from  the  historical  fact  that  Prince 
Friedrich  von  Homburg  won  the  battle  of  Fehrbellin 
in  1675  in  disobedience  to  the  commands  of  the 
Elector  of  Brandenburg.  The  prince  is  condemned  to 
die ;  the  Elector  refuses  to  entertain  the  pleading  of 
his  niece  Nathalie,  who  loves  the  prince,  and  even  of 
the  whole  army.  The  half-intrepid,  half-cowardly  young 
man  is  awakened  to  a  sense  of  responsibility  and  the 
need  of  military  discipline,  as  soon  as  the  Elector  places 
the  decision  of  his  fate  in  his  own  hands  ;  Friedrich 
frankly  recognises  the  justice  of  his  sentence  and,  in 
doing  so,  wins  the  Elector's  pardon.  With__Zter  Prinz 
von  Homburg  Kleist  has  given  Prussia  her  greatest 
national  drama. 


KLEIST   AS    A    NOVELIST;    GRABBE.  213 

Kleist  was  also  a  novelist  :  two  volumes  containing 
eight  Erziihlungen  appeared  in  1810  and  1811.  The 
best  of  these,  and  one  of  the  finest  novels  of  its  time, 
is  the  powerful  story  of  MMaet  -J&hlAaas.  Kohlhaas 
was  a  historical  personage,  a  horse-dealer  of  the  six- 
teenth century,  who  in  sullen  determination  to  obtain 
justice  from  a  nobleman  who  has  taken  advantage  of 
him,  brings  his  country  to  the  brink  of  civil  war;  and 
he  ultimately  lays  his  head  on  the  block  with  the 
proud  conviction  that  the  deed  for  which  he  does 
penance  has  helped  towards  improving  the  justice  of 
the  world.  The  spirit  of  this  story,  which  is  told  in  a 
straightforward,  realistic  way,  is  very  different  from  the 
dreamy  passivity  of  the  Romanticists,  and  reveals  some- 
thing of  the  forces  which  underlay  the  revolt  against 
Napoleon. 

But  Kleist,  who  thus  opened  up  new  possibilities  of 
development  for  the  German  drama,  failed  to  win  the 
sympathy  of  the  Romantic  critics,  as  he  failed  to  con- 
vince the  classicists  that  Schiller  had  not  said  the  last 
word  in  dramatic  poetry.  Meanwhile  the  North  German 
drama  on  Romantic  lines  did  not  rise  above  mediocrity. 
The  historical  drama  was  particularly  in  favour,  owing  to 
the  stimulus  which  the  later  Romantic  movement  had 
given  to  the  study  of  the  national  past ;  F.  L.  G.  von 
Raumer's  Geschichte  der  Plohenstaufen  und  Hirer  Zeit 
{1823-25)  was  an  inexhaustible  mine  for  the  dramatists 
of  the  period.  From  this  source  Ernst  von  Raupach 
(1784-1852)  constructed  a  series  of  no  less  than  twenty- 
four  historical  dramas,  which,  however,  show  little  origin- 
ality and  very  modest  poetic  attainment.  A  much  more 
gifted  playwright  of  the  epoch,  C.  D.  Grabbe_(  1801-36), 
whose  unbalanced,  dissolute  life  recalls  the  careers  of 
the  early  "Stiirmer  und  Dranger,"  also  planned  a  cycle 
of  Hohenstaufen  dramas,  of  which,  however,  only  two 
were  completed,  Kaiser  Friedrich  Barbarossa  (1829)  and 
Kaiser  Heinrich  VI.  (1830).  Better  known  is  Grabbe's 
bold  imaginative  flight  in  his  Don  Juan  imd  Faust 
(1829),  a  grandiose  attempt  to  weld  together  two  themes 


214      THE    DRAMA    UNDER    ROMANTIC    INFLUENCE. 

with  which  Mozart  and  Goethe  had  already  familiarised 
their  countrymen.  Admirable,  too,  both  in  construction 
and  sharpness  of  dramatic  characterisation,  is  Grabbe's 
Napoleonic  drama,  Napoleon,  oder  die  hundert  Tage 
(1831).  Without  doubt,  Grabbe  was  the  strongest 
dramatic  talent  that  North  Germany  produced  between 
Kleist  and  Hebbel. 

But  the  real  home  of  the  German  drama  in  the  earlier 
nineteenth  century  was  Vienna ;  the  great  Hofburgtheater 
m  Vienna  maintained  undisputed  all  through  the  century 
its  leading  position  in  the  German-speaking  world.  The 
Hapsburgs  had  done  much  by  liberal  patronage  to 
help  their  theatre  into  this  position  at  the  close  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  but  the  real  secret  of  its  success  lay 
in  the  dramatic  instincts  of  the  Viennese  people.  The 
Austrians  are  in  this  respect  the  most  gifted  of  the  German 
races,  and  since  early  in  the  eighteenth  century  a  living 
Viennese  popular  drama  had  existed  quite  independently 
of  the  literary  drama.  In  its  general  culture,  however, 
Austria  lagged  considerably  behind  North  Germany,  even 
at  the  zenith  of  the  classical  period :  H.  J.  von  Collin 
(1771-1811),  for  instance,  the  first  prominent  Austrian 
dramatist  at  the  opening  of  the  century,  had  closer  ties 
with  the  earlier  classical  or  pseudo-classical  drama  than 
with  Schiller.  Collin's  first  drama,  Regulus,  a  severely 
classical  play,  was  received  with  extravagant  favour  in 
1 80 1, — a  favour  which  seems  to  have  blinded  Collin's 
countrymen  to  the  higher  merits  of  his  later  plays, 
Coriolan  (1804)  and  Bianca  delta  Porta  (1808).  His 
fame,  however,  soon  grew  pale  before  the  rapid  im- 
provement of  Austrian  taste,  the  greater  familiarity  with 
Schiller,  above  all,  before  the  rise  of  an  Austrian  drama- 
tist of  the  very  first  rank  in  Franz  Grillparzer. 

Grillparzer's  life  was  tragic,  not  as  Werner's  or  Grabbe's 
had  been,  owing  to  a  want  of  moral  balance,  but  in  a 
negative  and  passive  way  :  nio^ temperament,  but  the  lack" 
of  a  strong  individuality  and  an  energetic  will,  was  trie 
rock  on  which  Grillparzer  made  shipwreck  ;  he  endured 
and  renounced  where  a  strong  man  would  have  asserted 


GRILLPARZER. 


215 


himself  and  rebelled.     It  is  this  peculiarity  in  Grillparzer 
that  makes  him  so  unique  a  figure  in  the  modern  dramatic 
literature  of  Europe.    The  antithesis  of  a  Schiller  or  Victor 
Hugo,  he  gave  the  Europe  of  the  age   of  pessimism   a 
drama  which  corresponded  better   to  its  spiritual   needs 
and     reflected     more     faithfully    its     spiritual     conflicts. 
Franz   Grillparzer   was    born    in   Vienna   on   January    15, 
1791  ;    the  associations   of  his   childhood  and   boyhood 
made    him    always    look   back    on    the    spacious,    liberal 
era  of  Joseph  II.  as  a  kind  of  golden  age  ;    for  it  was 
the  tragedy  of  Grillparzer's    life   that   he   had   to  spend 
his  best  years  under  the  crushing  tyranny  of  the  regime 
of  Prince  Metternich.      Except  for  journeys  to   Italy,   to 
Germany,    where    he    made    Goethe's    acquaintance,    to 
France  and  England,  and  to  Greece,  his  career  was  the 
uneventful  one  of  j.  Viennese  government  official.     He 
ultimately  rose   to  be   director   of  the   Imperial  Archive, 
a  position  which    he   retained  until    1856,   long  after  he 
had  ceased   to    take   an    active    interest  in    the   theatre. 
His   death  took   place  at  Vienna  on  January   21,    1872. 
Like  Schiller,  Grillparzer  leapt  into  fame  with  his  first 
play;  Die^  Ahnfrau  was  produced  in  1817  in  Vienna,  and 
mad_e  so  deep  and  lasting  an  impression  that  Grillparzer 
was,  all  his  life  long,  associated  with  the  group  of  "  fate 
Dramatists."      But  Die  Ahnfrau,   in  spite  of  its  ghostly, 
romantic   subject — an  ancestress,  who    for  a  crime  com- 
mitted in  life  is  doomed  to  haunt  the  family  until  her  last 
descendant  is  extinct,  and  a  robber-lover,  who  turns  out 
to  be  the  brother  of  his  betrothed, — is  a  powerful  tragedy, 
and    has    more    in    common    with    Schiller's    Brant   von 
Messina  and  Shakespeare's  Macbeth  than  with  the  tawdry 
"fate  tragedies"  of  Milliner.     The  command  of  dramatic 
effect   in    this   tragedy   is   the   more   surprising   when    we 
compare  it  with  Blanka  von   Castilien,  a  verbose  experi- 
ment in  the  style  oiDon  Carlos,  on  which  Grillparzer  had 
practised  his  hand  a  year  or  two  before.     In  1 8 1 8  appeared 
Saggho,  a  play  on  avowedly  classic  lines,  jthe  poet  hoping 
that  he  might  remove  with  it  the  impression  that  he  be- 
longed to  a  school  of  dramatists  he  despised.    Sappho  is  the 


2l6       THE    DRAMA    UNDER    ROMANTIC    INFLUENCE. 

tragedy  of  genius  ;  the  Greek  poetess  realises  that  the 
price  of  fame  is  the  renunciation  of  earthly  love  and 
happiness.  Classic,  too,  is  Grillparzer's  next  work,  the 
trilogy  of  Das  goldene  Vliesj  (1820).  In  agreement  with 
a.n  opfmbn  which  Schiller,  unknown  to  Grillparzer,  had 
once  expressed  about  the  theme  to  Goethe,  he 
dramatised,  as  none  of  his  many  predecessors  had 
attempted  to  do,  the  whole  saga  of  the  Argonauts,  the 
love  and  hate  of  Jason  and  Medea  from  the  beginning, 
and  not  merely  the  final  catastrophe  in  Medea's  life. 
Gastfreund,  the  first  part  of  Das  goldene  Vliess,  is 


in  one  act,  and  describes  the  fatal  murder  of  Phryxus 
by  Medea's  father  ;  this  crime  clings  like  a  curse  to 
the  Fleece  and  brings  misery  and  death  to  all  through 
whose  hands  it  passes.  In  "  Die  Argonauten  Jason 
comes  to  Colchis  in  search  of  the  Fleece  ;  he  sees 
Medea,  loves  her,  and  with  her  aid  secures  the  coveted 
trophy  ;  she  returns  with  him  to  Greece  as  his  wife.  In 
the  third  drama  of  the  trilogy,  Medea,^  Grillparzer  brings 
the  conflict  between  husband  ancTwHe,  which  he  has  thus 
carefully  prepared,  into  touch  with  quite  modern  ethical 
problems.  Weak  and  vacillating,  Jason  cannot  face  the 
scorn  that  his  barbarian  wife  draws  down  on  him  in 
Corinth  ;  he  turns  away  from  her  to  find  a  gentler  partner 
in  Kreusa,  daughter  of  the  Corinthian  king.  In  revenge 
for  the  wrong  —  of  which  we  are  better  able  to  judge  from 
Grillparzer's  work  than  from  other  Medea  dramas,  for  we 
have  known  Medea  as  a  girl  in  Colchis  —  Medea  slays 
her  children  and  sets  the  palace  on  fire.  At  the  close  of 
the  tragedy  she  takes  a  last  farewell  of  Jason,  to  bear 
the  symbol  of  evil,  the  Golden  Fleece,  back  to  Delphi, 
whence  it  came. 

With  Das  goldene  Vliess,  or  at  least  with  Medea,  Grill- 
j>arzer  won  a  place  for  himself  in  the  first  rank  of  dramatic 
poets.  In  his  next  two  works  he  turned  to  the  historical 
drama.  Konig  Ottokars  Gliick  und  Ende  (1825)  is  in 
Austrian  literature  what  Der  Prinz  von  Hamburg  is  in 
Prussian,  the  representative  national  tragedy  ;  it  has  even 
been  claimed,  and  with  considerable  justice,  as  the  greatest 


GRILLPARZER'S  MASTER-WORKS.  217 

historical  tragedy  of  the  nineteenth  century.  The  theme 
of  the  drama  is  the  rise  and  fall  of  Ottokar  of  Bohemia 
in  his  vain  struggle  against  Rudolf  of  Hapsburg.  With 
greater  originality  than  Kleist,  Grillparzer  has  here  broken 
with  the  historical  style  of  Schiller  and  created  a  tragedy 
which  combines  faithfulness  to  the  spirit  of  history  and 
to  the  psychology  of  character,  with  ideas  of  the  poet's 
own  time,  a  time  that  was  dominated  by  the  rise  and 
fall  of  a  mightier  than  Ottokar — Napoleon.  Grillparzer's 
second  historical  tragedy,  Ein  treuer  Diener  seines  Herrn 
(1828),  the  story  of  the  Hungarian  Bankban's  almost  in- 
human self-effacement  in  the  service  of  his  king,  gave  the 
poet  an  opportunity  of  depicting  in  its  most  ruthless 
aspects  that  eternal  conflict  between  will  and  duty  which 
was  so  real  to  himself. 

Once  more  in  Des  Meeres  und  der  Liebe  VVellen  (1831), 
Grillparzer  returned  to  Greek  antiquity  ;  the  subject  is  the 
love-story  of  Hero  and  Leander,  as  related  by  the  late 
Greek  poet  Musaeus.  Into  this,  the  most  Romantic  of 
all  the  sagas  that  have  come  down  to  us  from  antiquity, 
Grillparzer  introduced  a  very  modern  element  of  psycho- 
logical analysis.  Love  converts  the  passive,  irresolute 
Leander,  who  has  caught  a  glimpse  of  Hero  within  the 
precincts  of  her  temple,  into  a  man  of  all  too  daring 
action  ;  while  Hero  develops  from  the  na'ive  child  to  a 
heroine  of  tragic  dignity.  The  scene  in  Hero's  cell  after 
Leander  has  swum  the  Hellespont  is,  in  its  naive  sincerity 
and  poetic  truth,  one  of  the  most  beautiful  love-scenes 
in  modern  dramatic  literature.  On  a  second  attempt  to 
swim  across,  a  storm  arises,  the  guiding  light  in  Hero's 
window  is  treacherously  extinguished,  and  the  waves  of 
the  sea  triumph  over  those  of  love.  Next  morning 
Leander's  body  is  washed  up  on  the  shore,  and  Hero 
dies  of  grief.  Der  Traum  ein  Leben  (1834),  Grillparzer's 
next  drama,  was  begun  as  early  as  1817,  and  is  written 
in  the  same  Spanish  trochaic  verse  which  he  employed 
so  effectively  in  Die  Ahnfrau.  As  Calder6n  had,  in  the 
play  La  vida  es  sueno — in  German,  Das  Leben  ein  Traum 
— which  suggested  Grillparzer's  title,  depicted  a  prince 


2l8      THE    DRAMA    UNDER    ROMANTIC    INFLUENCE. 

who  believes  that  the  life  he  lives  is  a  dream,  so  here 
Rustan,  an  ambitious  country  youth, _is_  made  to^see  in 
'  a  dream  his  overweening  ambitions  realised.  With  his 
uncle's  slave  Zanga  at  his  side,  he  sees  himself  saving 
the  life  of  the  King  of  Samarcand,  and  rapidly  rising  into 
favour  at  the  latter's  court ;  but  his  success  is  attained 
by  deceit  and  crime.  He  is  ultimately  unmasked,  and, 
fleeing  for  his  life,  awakens  at  the  critical  moment.  The 
nightmare  has  taught  him  that  quietist  faith  which  the 
Metternich  regime  had  engrained  in  the  Austrian  people, 
that  peace  of  soul  and  contentment  with  one's  lot  are  the 
only  ideals  worth  striving  for. 

In  1838  Grillparzer's  first  and  only  comedy,  WeK  dem 
der  lugt,  was  produced  in  Vienna  and  failed  ignominiously. 
The  disappointment  brought  about  a  crisis  in  the  poet's 
life ;  he  withdrew  from  all  active  interest  in  the  theatre, 
and  his  remaining  plays,  with  the  exception  of  a  beautiful 
fragment  of  a  drama  on  the  subject  of  Esther,  which  ap- 
peared in  1863,  were  not  published  until  after  his  death 
in  1872.  These  were  three  in  number — Libussa,  a  master- 
piece of  dramatic  poetry,  although  lacking  in  the  life  and 
movement  which  make  an  effective  stage-play  ;  a  historical 
tragedy,  Ein  Bruderzivist  in  Hapslmrg,  and  Die  Jildin  von 
Toledo,  an  admirable  adaptation  of  a  play  by  Grillparzer's 
favourite  dramatist,  Lope  de  Vega.  Of  the  poet's  other 
works,  mention  must  be  made  of  his  lyric  poetry,  especially 
the  group  of  verse  which  bears  the  title  Tristia  ex  Ponto 
(1835).  Here  all  the  bitterness  of  the  poet's  dis- 
appointed life,  his  own  lack  of  confidence  in  his  genius, 
and  his  passive  renunciation,  are  expressed  with  an 
emotional  sincerity  which  gives  him  a  high  place  among 
Austria's  lyric  poets.  In  prose  he  has  left  us  a  volume 
of  penetrating  criticism  on  Spanish  literature,  records  of 
his  life  and  travels,  and  two  short  stories,  Das  Kloster 
bei  Sendomir  (1828)  and  Der  arme  Spielmann  (1847), 
the  latter  one  of  the  best  Austrian  "  Novellen  "  written 
under  Romantic  auspices.  Grillparzer,  like  Schopenhauer, 
whose  pessimistic  outlook  on  life  he  shared,  came  late 
into  his  kingdom.  The  generation  that  had  grown  up  on 


OTHER   AUSTRIAN    DRAMATISTS.  2IQ 

Schopenhauer's  philosophy  and  had  felt  the  spell  of 
Wagner's  masterpieces,  first  discovered  the  great  poet  in 
Grillparzer;  only  within  the  last  two  decades  has  his 
genius  been  generally  recognised. 

There  were  many  other  Austrian  dramatists  in  the  first 
half  of  the  nineteenth  century,  but  only  a  few  can  be 
mentioned  here.  E.  F.  J.  von  Miinch-Bellinghausen 
(1806-71),  writing  under  the  pseudonym  of  "  Friedrich 
Halrn,"  enjoyed  a  greater  reputation  in  his  day  than  Grill- 
parzer ;  but  his  work,  like  that  of  his  predecessor  Collin, 
was  only  of  ephemeral  interest.  Plays  like  Der  Sohn  der 
Wildnis  (1842)  and  Der  Fechter  von  Ravenna  (1854) 
are,  to  modern  taste,  disfigured  by  an  effeminate  senti- 
mentality and  a  lack  of  poetic  seriousness.  A  finer,  if 
also  somewhat  evanescent  talent  was  that  of  Eduard  von 
Bauernfeld  (1802-90),  who  in  his  long  series  of  comedies 
gave  admirable  pictures  of  the  Viennese  life  of  his  time. 
His  strength  lies  in  the  fineness  and  delicacy  of  his  work- 
manship, but  his  talent  was  not  robust  enough  to  assert 
itself  beside  the  undisguised  striving  after  effect  in  the 
imported  French  comedy.  The  Austrian  taste  for  the 
Spanish  drama,  which  Grillpar/er  shared  and  helped  to 
foster,  is  seen  in  the  hold  which  the  Spanish  drama  had 
luTcTstill  has  on  the  Viennese  stage.  Joseph  Schreyvogel 
(1768-1832),  the  first  important  director  of  the  Hofburg- 
theater,  translated  under  the  pseudonym  of  "  C.  A.  West " 
dramas  by  Calderon  and  Moreto,  which  are  still  in  the 
German  repertory,  and  Der  Stern  von  Sevilla  (1830) 
and  Kerker  und  Krone  (1834),  once  popular  plays  by 
J.  C.  von  Zedlitz  (1790-1862),  were  strongly  influenced 
by  Spanish  models. 

The  best  tribute  to  the  dramatic  genius  of  the  Vien- 
nese" is  their  "  Volksdrama,"  or  popular  drama.  The 
"""Wiener  Posse,"  a  distinctly  Austrian  development  of  the 
Italian  "  commedia  dell'  arte,"  and  consequently  akin  to 
the  older  English  pantomime,  had  a  large  number  of 
talented  writers  in  its  service  at  the  beginning  of  the 
nineteenth  century;  and  to  the  tradition  which  they 
created  belong  the  works  of  two  playwrights  of  genius, 


220      THE    DRAMA    UNDER    ROMANTIC    INFLUENCE. 

Ferdinand  Raimund  (1790-1836)  and  Johann  Nestroy 
(1801-62).  After  Grillparzer,  Raimund  is  the  most 
original  dramatic  genius  that  Austria  has  produced ;  by 
temperament  moody  and  misanthropic,  by  profession  a 
comic  actor  at  a  Viennese  suburban  theatre,  Raimund 
shot  himself  in  a  fit  of  melancholy  at  the  age  of  forty- 
six.  His  literary  significance  lies  in  the  fact  that  he 
invested  the  traditional  "Posse  "  with  a  poetic  seriousness 
hitherto  lacking  in  it;  Der  Bauer  als  Milliondr  (1826), 
and  above  all,  Der  Alpenkonig  imd  der  Menschenfeind 
(1828)  and  Der  Verschwender  (1833)  are  creations  of  a 
natural  genius  that  has  been  little  influenced  by  higher 
literary  considerations,  but  they  deserve  a  place  beside  the 
best  German  comedies  of  the  century.  A  very  different 
type  of  writer  was  Nestroy,  whose  successful  rivalry  with 
Raimund  was  one  of  the  hardest  blows  the  latter  had 
to  bear  ;  there  is  no  poetry,  no  sentiment,  no  depth  in 
Nestroy's  work,  but  it  is  extraordinarily  brilliant  and 
witty.  In  Der  biise  Geist  Liunpacivagabundus  (1833),  his 
first  and  best  known  farce,  and  still  more  in  plays  that 
are  less  familiar  outside  Austria,  like  Das  Madl  aus 
der  Vorstadt  (1841)  and  Einen  Jux  will  er  sich  machen 
(1842),  Nestroy  shows  himself  the  equal  of  the  best 
French  farce-writers  of  the  century ;  he  stands  alone  in 
the  German  drama  as  a  master  of  the  wit  of  situation. 
No  history  of  the  German  drama  in  the  first  half  of 
the  nineteenth  century  can  afford  to  ignore  the  music- 
drama  or  opera.  For Jn  Germany,  as  in  the  Italy  of  the 
seventeenth  century,  the  opera  was,  and  still  is,  a  pro- 
vince of  the  national  drama.  The  heritage  of  Gluck  had 
passed,  as  we  have  seen,  to  Mozart,  whose  dramatic  work 
was  intimately  associated  with  Austria ;  Mozart's  last 
masterpiece,  Die  Zauberflote  (1791),  was  a  national  play, 
a  Viennese  "  Posse,"  inspired  by  the  Josephine  ideals. 
Fidelw,  the  only  opera  by  the  next  in  the  line  of  great 
German  musicians,  Ludwig  van  Beethoven  (1770-1827), 
was  produced  in  Vienna  in  1805,  and  formed  a  link  be- 
tween Mozart  and  the  Romantic  music-dramatists.  Of 
these  the  most  important  is  Karl  Maria  von  Weber  (1786- 


THE    OPERA.  221 

1826),  whose  three  masterpieces,  Der  Freischiitz  (1821), 
Euryanthe  (1823),  and  Oberon  (1826),  are  in  many  ways 
a  more  faithful  reproduction  of  the  Romantic  mood  than 
any  of  the  literary  dramas  of  the  period.  Weber  was  fol- 
lowed by  the  no  less  Romantic  Heinrich  Mavschner  (1795- 
1861),  the  composer  of  Der  Vampir  (1828),  Der  Templer 
und  die  Jildin  (1829),  and  Hans  Heiling  (1833).  For  a 
time,  under  French  influence,  the  German  opera  abandoned 
this  national  form  to  cultivate  the  insincere  pseudo- 
Romanticism  of  the  so-called  "grand  opera,"  a  form  of 
which  Jakob  Meyerbeer  (1791-1864)  was  the  chief 
representative.  But  with  Richard  Wagner  (1813-83), 
whose  early  work,  Rienzi  (1842),  was  still  "grand  opera," 
the  music-drama  was  led  back  again  to  Romantic  sincerity; 
Der  fliegende  Hollander  (1843),  Tannhauser  (1845),  and 
Lohengrin  (1850)  were  great  steps  in  its  regeneration.  But 
even  these  works,  rooted  in  Romanticism  as  they  were, 
were  in  advance  of  their  time,  and  the  second  half  of  the 
century  was  well  advanced  before  Wagner  found  recogni- 
tion as  a  national  dramatist. 


222 


CHAPTER    XX. 

LITERATURE    IN    SWABIA    AND    AUSTRIA. 

THE  nationalism  with  which  the  nineteenth  century_ 
opened  was  all  in  favour  of  the  development  of  what 
might  be  called  the  spirit  of  place  in  German  literature. 
Dialect  literature  was  cultivated  to  a  degree  unknown 
before,  and  purely  tribal  and  local  ideas  found  an  ex- 
pression in  poetry  which  would  not  have  been  tolerated 
in  earlier  centuries,  or  in  periods  which  aimed  at  metro- 
politan concentration.  The  Low  German  races,  which  in 
the  seventeenth  century  had  futilely  attempted  to  assert 
their  literary  individuality,  now  produced  a  novelist  of 
such  eminence  as  Fritz  Reuter,  while  in  the  South  we  find 
a  Swabian  literature,  an  Austrian  literature,  and  even  the 
beginnings  of  a  Swiss  literature  in  German. 

The  Swabian  movement  of  the  nineteenth  century  offers 
the  greatest  possible  contrast  to  the  cosmopolitanism 
of  the  two  greatest  Swabians  of  the  eighteenth,  Wieland 
and  Schiller ;  the  new  school  was  an  offshoot  of  the 
Romantic  movement.  The  Swabian  poets,  who  looked 
up  to  Uhland  as  their  leader,  preserved  faithfully  the 
Romantic  ideals,  if  not  those  of  the  first  Romantic  School, 
at  least  of  the  Heidelberg  Romanticists ;  in  Swabia, 
in  fact,  Romanticism  seemed  best  protected  against  that 
disintegration  and  decay  which  rapidly  overtook  the 
movement  elsewhere,  after  the  fall  of  Napoleon  had 
changed  the  political  aspect  of  Germany.  The  mission 
of  the  Swabians,  it  might  be  said,  was  to  keep  alive  the 
Romantic  traditions  during  the  barren  age  of  "Young 


LUDWIG    UHLAND.  223 

Germany"   and   to    hand    them    on    to    the    generation 


Johann  Ludwig  Uhland,  a  native  of  Tubingen,  where 
he  was  born  in  1787,  was  a  man  of  very  varied  interests, 
poetry  occupying  a  comparatively  small  place  in  his  life. 
The  son  of  the  university  secretary  in  Tubingen,  he  re- 
mained all  his  life  long  in  close  touch  with  academic  circles, 
and  was  for  a  time  himself  professor  of  German  philology 
in  his  native  town;  his  scholarly  publications,  collected 
between  1865  and  1873  m  eignt  volumes  under  the  title 
Schriften  zur  Geschichte  der  Dichtung  und  Sage,  and 
especially  his  admirable  collection  of  Alte  hoch-  und 
niederdeutsche  Volkslieder  (1844-45),  are  stiU  invalu- 
able to  the  student.  His  philological  pursuits  were 
interrupted  by  an  active  interest  in  political  questions. 
He  hoped  no  less  ardently  than  the  most  advanced 
demagogues  of  his  time  that  the  national  rising  of  1813 
might  result  in  a  free  and  constitutionally  governed  Ger- 
many, and  he  shared  their  disappointment  when  the 
reaction  set  in.  In  1848,  when  a  brighter  day  seemed  at 
last  about  to  dawn  for  German  freedom,  Uhland  again 
came  forward  as  a  politician,  and  was  a  prominent 
member  of  the  short-lived  German  parliament  which  held 
its  sittings  in  the  Pauluskirche  in  Frankfort.  He  died  at 
Tubingen  on  November  13,  1862. 

Uhland's  two  dominant  interests  in  life,  that  in  the 
history  of  the  German  past  and  in  the  political  questions 
of  the  present,  gave  his  work  as  a  poet  its  stamp.  His 
ballad  -  poetry,  for  instance — and  it  is  as  a  ballad-poet 
that  Uhland  is  greatest, — shows  how  much  he  had  gained 
from  His  careful  study  of  mediaeval  poetry,  Romance  as 
well  as  German ;  and  his  warm  interest  in  the  contemporary 
strivings  of  his  people  made  him  more  of  a  realist  than  his 
Heidelberg  predecessors.  Never,  even  in  his  most  Roman- 
tic flights,  did  Uhland  lose  his  common  -  sense  outlook 
upon  life,  his  feeling  for  the  realities  of  things  ;  he  allowed 
no  Romantic  veil  to  come  between  him  and  the  "Volk." 
He  has  been  well  called  the  "  Klassiker  der  Romantik." 
Typical  ballads  of  his  earlier  period  are  Das  Schloss  am 


224         LITERATURE    IN    SWABIA    AND    AUSTRIA. 

Meer  (1805),  Klein  Roland  (1808),  Konig  Karls  Meerfahrt 
(1812),  Taillefer  (1812),  Des  Stingers  Much  (1814),  and 
Graf  Eberhard  der  Rauschebart  (1815);  of  his  later  years, 
Das  Gliick  von  Edenhall  (1834).  These,  together  with 
Uhland's  wonderful  imitations  of  the  Volkslied,  such  as 
Der  gute  Kamerad  (1809)  and  Der  Wirtin  Tochterlein 
(1809),  belong  to  the  masterpieces  of  German  ballad  and 
lyric  poetry.  Uhland  was  also  ambitious  of  fame  as  a 
dramatist,  but  neither  Ernst,  Herzog  von  Schwaben  (1818), 
nor  Ludwig  der  Bayer  (1819),  full  of  genuine  poetry  as 
they  are,  is  written  with  a  knowledge  of  the  needs  and 
conditions  of  the  theatre. 

Of  the  lesser  poets  who  revolved  like  satellites  round 
Uhland,  the  most  considerable  is  Justiflus^Kernjer  (1786- 
1862),  who,  like  Uhland,  had  a  profession  apart  from  his 
literary  interests.  He  was  a  doctor,  and  his  hospitable 
home  in  the  little  Swabian  town  of  Weinsberg  was  a  centre 
of  pilgrimage  for  the  poets  and  literary  enthusiasts  of  the 
time.  His  first  book,  Reiseschatten,  von  dem  Schauspieler 
Luchs  (i 8 1 1),  is  in  its  mixture  of  poetry  and  prose,  humour 
and  seriousness,  a  kind  of  forerunner  of  the  later  "  Reise- 
bilder "  of  Heine  and  other  "Young  German"  writers. 
His  Gedichte  first  appeared  collected  in  1826.  Less 
gifted  than  Uhland,  Kerner  had  more  of  the  irresponsible 
spontaneity  of  the  older  Romanticists  ;  his  songs,  especi- 
ally those  in  the  manner  of  the  Volkslied,  are  unin- 
fluenced by  that  historical  culture  which  gives  classic 
polish  to  Uhland's  ;  and  his  subjective  poetry  is  tinged 
with  a  mysticism  which  was  equally  foreign  to  Uhland's 
lucid  and  sober  mind.  Like  Brentano,  with  whom  Kerner 
had  many  points  in  common,  he  gave  himself  up  in  later 
years  to  the  study  of  the  mystic  borderland  between  the 
natural  and  the  supernatural ;  his  strange  book,  Die 
Seherin  von  Prevorst  (1829),  the  study  of  a  peculiar  case 
of  somnambulism,  belongs,  in  its  imaginative  interpreta- 
tion, rather  to  literature  than  to  medical  science. 

Another  member  of  Uhland's  circle,  Gustav  jscjhwab^ 
(1792-1850),  was  a  pastor,  and  devoted  his  leisure  to 
an  extensive  and  varied  literary  activity.  He  wrote  a  life 


MINOR    SWABIAN    WRITERS.  225 

of  Schiller,  revived  the  memory  of  older  writers  such  as 
Rollenhagen  and  Paul  Fleming,  translated  Lamartine,  and, 
best  of  all,  edited  the  German  Volksbiicher  (1836-37),  a 
work  that  is  still  one  of  the  treasures  of  the  German 
household.  Several  of  his  songs  have  become  popular, 
but  on  the  whole  his  lyric  is  not  inspired.  Hermann 
Kurz  (1813-73),  a  younger  man  than  Schwab,  also 
distinguished  himself  as  a  translator  and  interpreter  of 
the  older  literature ;  his  novels,  Schillers  Heimatjahrt 
(1843)  and  Der  Sonnenwirt  (1854),  are  among  the  books 
of  this  time  which  are  still  read  in  Germany.  Karl  Mayer 
(1786-1870)  and  Gustav  Pfizer  (1807-90),  two  other 
members  of  the  group,  are,  undeservedly,  more  forgotten 
to-day  than  Schwab  ;  while  Wilhelm  Waiblinger  (1804-30), 
the  most  genuinely  Romantic  and  the  most  unhappy  of 
them  all,  certainly  deserves  a  better  place  in  his  country- 
men's memory  than  that  which  he  occupies.  He  belonged 
to  the  group,  however,  only  by  virtue  of  his  birth  ;  his 
work  was  in  a  different  vein  from  theirs ;  he  spent  the  best 
years  of  his  short  life  in  Italy  and  wrote  enthusiastic  lyrics  in 
the  cause  of  Greece  (Lieder  der  Griechen,  1823).  Wilhelm 
Hauff  (1802-27),  the  novelist  of  the  Swabian  circle,  was 
cut  off  in  early  manhood  ;  but  we  owe  to  him  one  of  the 
best  German  imitations  of  the  Waverley  Novels,  Lichten- 
stein  (1826),  some  excellent  short  stories,  such  as  Das 
Bild  des  Kaisers  (1828),  and  a  fantastic  sketch  in  the 
manner  of  Hoffmann,  Phantasien  im  Bremer  Ratskeller 
(1827). 

The  Hmitations  of  this  Swabian  group  of  poets  may  be 
inferfedTrom  the  writers  that  have  just  been  discussed— 
their_parochialism  and  their  somewhat  narrow  outlook  ; 
literature  was  to  them  the  pastime  of  idle  moments,  rather 
thlfn  the  main  business  of  their  lives.  Only  Uhland  and 
Waiblingen  allowed  themselves  to  venture  beyond  the 
Swabian  horizon,  and  to  take  an  interest  in  the  political 
and  intellectual  movements  of  the  outside  world.  And 
yet  this  little  circle  did  produce,  and  from  the  very  midst 
of  its  limitations,  a_  lyric  poet  of  the  first  rank,  Eduard 
Morike  (1804-75)",  Pastor  in  the  Swabian  village  of 

p 


226        LITERATURE    IN    SWABIA   AND   AUSTRIA. 

Cleversulzbach,  and  subsequently  lecturer  on  German 
literature  in  Stuttgart.  A  quiet,  retiring  man,  who  wrote 
little  and  hardly  came  into  contact  with  the  world  of 
letters  at  all,  Morike  is  a  better  representative  of  the 
Swabian  spirit  than  Uhland  ;  for  here  we  have  the  pecu- 
liarly Swabian  form  of  Romanticism  at  its  best.  His 
Gedichte,  which  appeared  collected  in  1838,  contain  a 
number  of  poems,  such  as  Jung  Volker  (1826),  Das 
verlassene  Mddchen  (1829),  Agnes  (1831),  Schon-Rohtraut 
(1837),  Soldatenbraut(\^^~)^  and  Ein  Stiindlein  wohl  vor 
Tag  (1837),  which  are  unsurpassed  in  the  whole  range  of 
German  lyric  poetry.  Morike's  charm  lies  in  a  perfect  truth 
and  simplicity  combined  with  a  reticence  which  implies 
more  than  it  expresses,  which  spiritualises  rather  than 
lays  bare  the  emotions  of  the  soul.  And  so  delicate 
and  fragile  is  this  art  that  it  can  hardly  even  be  adapted 
to  the  robuster  type  of  ballad.  The  lyric  quality  is  also 
prominent  in  Morike's  prose  writings.  One  of  these,  and 
the  most  ambitious,  is  an  unfinished  novel,  Maler  Nolten 
(1832),  which  forms  a  landmark  in  the  development  of 
the  Romantic  novel  from  its  original  starting-point  in 
Wilhelm  Meister.  Morike,  however,  has  but  little  of 
the  talent  that  goes  to  the  making  of  a  good  novelist ; 
Male?-  No/ten  is  fragmentary  and  formless,  and  has  as 
good  as  no  plot  or  construction  :  its  characters  are  neither 
conceived  nor  presented  dramatically ;  but — and  here  lies 
the  peculiar  charm  of  the  book — they  are  drawn  with  that 
"delicacy  of  insight  into  the  hidden  workings  of  heart  and 
mind  which  is  so  peculiarly  characteristic  of  Morike's  lyric 
poetry. 

In  the  German  literature  of  the  last  two  centuries  every 
literary  movement  has  been  associated  more  or  less  closely 
with  some  line  of  philosophic  thought ;  every  school  has 
had  its  philosopher.  The  Swabian  thinker  who  provided 
the  philosophical  background  for  the  present  school  was 
not,  as  might  perhaps  have  been  expected,  the  greatest  of 
all  Swabian  philosophers,  Hegel,  whose  influence  was  then 
in  the  ascendant,  but  F.  Th.  Vischer  (1807-87),  whose 
Asthetik  (1847-58)  was  one  of  the  influential  books  of 


MORIKE    AND    VISCHER;    AUSTRIAN    POETS.       227 

its  time.  But  Vischer  was  not  merely  a  professor  of 
philosophy,  he  was  also  a  literary  critic  and  a  poet; 
his  Lyrische  Gdnge  (1882)  contains  verse  of  originality 
and  vigour,  and  his  humorous  and  satiric  novel,  Auch 
Einer  (1879),  is  still  popular. 

WhiJeiri_Swabia  the  great  Romantic  traditions  were 
kegPalTve  by^this  group  of  poets  until  a  period  when 
these  traditions  had  long  ceased  to  be  anything  but  a 
memory  to  the  rest  of  Germany,  a  parallel  movement 
of  a  similar  character  is  to  be  observed  in  Austria. 
But  Austria  being  geographically  further  removed  from 
the  Romantic  focuses,  her  literature  was  less  narrowly 
Romantic  in  its  character.  The  Austrians  were  influ- 
ed  by  the  Swabians,  certainly  by  Uhland,  but  they 


were  also  to  a  greater  extent  influenced  by,  the  chief 
poetic  force  in  Europe  at  the  beginning  of  the  century, 
Byron.  In  the  foregoing  chapter  we  have  seen  how  they 
had  built  up  for  themselves  a  national  drama  out  of 
elements  drawn  from  eighteenth-century  classicism  and 
German  and  Spanish  romanticism  ;  a  similar  individuality 
and  independence  is  to  be  traced  in  their  lyric  poetry. 
Earlier  than  in  North  Germany  the  Napoleonic  con- 
quest called  forth  a  patriotic  lyric  in  Austria,  the  best 
example  of  which  is  the  Wehrmannslieder  (1809)  of  the 
dramatist  H.  J.  von  Collin  ;  and  at  a  later  date  the  tyranny 
of  Metternich  provoked  a  poetry  of  political  revolt  which 
preceded  in  time  the  political  lyric  of  North  Germany. 
Of  this  later  movement  the  chief  representative  was  Graf 
Anton  Alexander  von  Auersperg  (1806-76),  who  was 
known  to  literature  as  "  Anastasius  Griin."  Griin's 
liberalism  is  most  definitely  expressed  in  the  volume- 
entitled  Spaziergdnge  ernes  Wiener  Poeten  (1831),  a  frank, 
although  in  its  satire  somewhat  guarded,  challenge  to  the 
Austrian  government.  Political,  too,  are,  more  or  less, 
the  poems  Der  letzte^  Ritter  (Maximilian  I.)  (1831),  Schutt 
(1836),  and  Nibelungen  im  Frack  (1850).  Satire  soon, 
however,  grows  old,  and  the  modern  reader  is  likely 
to  give  Griin  a  higher  place  as  the  purely  lyric  poet  of 
Blatter  der  Liebe  (1830). 


228        LITERATURE    IN    SWABIA    AND    AUSTRIA. 

Lyjic  poets  of  no  mean  order  were  also  two  of  the 
dramatists  of  the  period,  Grillparzer  and  Zedlitz.  The 
former's  Tristia  ex  Ponto  (1835),  a  cry  of  very  real  per- 
sonal suffering  from  the  dark  days  of  his  life  between 
1825  and  1835,  has  been  already  mentioned;  and  in  his 
later  years  he  gave  vent  to  his  dislikes  and  antipathies  in 
epigrams  and  satire.  The  tyranny  of  the  autocracy  weighed 
heavily  on  Grillparzer ;  it  ate  into  his  soul  and  threw  a 
shadow  over  all  his  life.  Zedlitz,  on  the  other  hand,  who 
showed  distinctly  higher  powers  as  a  lyric  poet  than  as  a 
dramatist,  kept  aloof  from  the  political  discontent  of  the 
time  and  sought  refuge  in  the  Romantic  poetry  of  Italy 
or  in  the  more  modern  phase  of  Romanticism  repre- 
sented by  Byron,  whom  he  translated  and  imitated.  His 
famous  Totenkranze  (1827),  threnodies  at  the  graves  of 
famous  personalities  in  history  and  fiction — Wallenstein 
and  Napoleon,  Romeo  and  Juliet,  Tasso  and  Byron — are 
among  the  best  imitations  of  Byronic  poetry  in  German 
literature,  while  some  of  his  ballads,  notably  Die  ndcht- 
liche  Heerschau  (1829),  are  worthy  of  the  great  German 
traditions. 

But  the  master-singer  of  Austria,  the  greatest  Austrian 
lyric  poet  since  Walther  von  der  Vogelweide,  was  the 
unhappy  T-PJ^H.  Nikolaus  Franz  Niembsch  von  Streh- 
lenau,  to  give  him  his  full  name,  was  born  at  Csatad 
in  Hungary  in  1802.  He  came  into  the  world  under 
an  unhappy  star,  and  his  whole  life  was  a  continuous 
battle  with  untoward  circumstances.  He  studied  at  the 
university  of  Vienna,  and  in  1831  came  into  touch  with 
the  Swabian  circle  of  poets ;  with  their  encouragement 
and  assistance  he  published  in  the  following  year  his  first 
volume  of  Gedichte.  There  is  little,  however,  that  is 
Swabian  in  his  poetic  talent ;  the  conditions  he  grew 
up  under  were  different,  and  his  verse  was  influenced  by 
other  models  than  those  which  they  admired.  At  times 
we  hear  an  echo  of  Eichendorff,  at  times  of  Goethe  ;  but 
of  all  the  poets  of  his  epoch  the  one  that  touched  the 
deepest  chord  in  Lenau's  nature  was  Byron.  Unlike 
Byron,  however,  Lenau  had  not  the  power  of  rising  above 


NIKOLAUS    LENAU.  22Q 

his  misery,  or  defying  it,  like  Heine,  with  contempt  and 
cynicism ;  Jiis_jDessimism  is  the  pessimism  of  blank,  un- 
relieved despair.  This  is  the  dominant  note  of  his  poetry, 
which  compares  with  that  of  Eichendorff  as  his  wind- 
swept Hungarian  pustas  in  autumn  with  the  leafy  vaults 
of  the  summer  forest  of  which  Eichendorff  sings  so 
jubilantly.  The  political  tyranny  in  Austria  rested  less 
heavily  on  Lenau  than  on  others  among  his  contem- 
poraries, because  his  own  personal  life  was  more  dis- 
traught ;  at  the  same  time,  it  was  with  great  hopes  and 
expectations  that  he  turned  his  back  on  the  old  world 
and  greeted  America  as  a  new  fatherland.  For  a  brief 
space  his  melancholy  was  forgotten  in  the  pristine  world 
of  the  West ;  the  veil  of  pessimism  lifts  in  his  American 
poems,  such  as  Der  Indzanerzug,  Das  Blockhaus,  ~h'iagdra~. 
'"But  if  was  only  a  brief  respite ;  disenchantment  dogged 
him  even  here,  and  he  returned  to  Europe  with  his  one 
great  hope  shattered.  He  settled  for  a  time  in  Vienna, 
then  near  his  Swabian  friends  in  Wiirtemberg,  and  when 
life  was  beginning  to  assume  a  more  kindly  aspect  and  its 
enigmas  to  press  less  insistently  on  him,  he  suddenly  be- 
came insane.  This  was  in  1844,  and  after  some  years 
in  an  asylum  he  died  in  1850.  Lenau's  work  comprises, 
besides  the  lyrics  of  his  Gedichte  (1832)  and  Neuere 
Gedichte  (1838,  1840),  an  epic  drama  on  the  subject  of 
Faust  (1836),  into  which  he  poured  his  own  scepticism 
and  despair,  and  two  epic  poems,  Savonarola  (1837)  and 
Die  Albigenser  (1842),  which  are  hardly  less  unrelievedly 
pessimistic. 

The  lyric  poets  of  the  middle  of  the  century  who 
were  associated  with  the  political  and  revolutionary 
movement  between  1840  and  1848,  will  be  discussed 
in  a  subsequent  chapter.  There  is,  however,  one  writer 
who  stood  aloof  from  both  the  political  and  literary 
m  overrent,  and  whose  place  is  more  obviously  with  the 
great  Swabian  and  Austrian  lyricists  than  with  the  political 
singers  :  Annette  von  Droste-Hiilshoff  (1797-1848),  Ger- 
many's greate^poefessT" ""A"  native  of  Westphalia  and  a 
strict  Catholic,  this  unassuming,  retiring  writer  had  lew 


230        LITERATURE    IN    SWABIA    AND   AUSTRIA. 

ties  with  her  contemporaries  ;  and  her  poetry  bears  the 
stamp  of  a  strong,  original  personality.  No  doubt  Byron 
influenced  to  some  extent,  her  longer  narrative  poems, 
such  as  jJas  Hosptk  auf  dem  grossen  St  Bernhard  (1838), 
and  the  magnificent  epic  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War,  Die 
Schlacht  im  Loener  Bruch  (1838)  :  there  is  a  touch  of  the 
pessimistic  mal  de  siecle  in  her  work,  but  nothing  of  the 
sentimental  Romantic  sweetness  common  to  most  of  her 
contemporaries  ;  indeed,  she  is  at  times  almost  repellent 
in  her  ascetic  strength.  As  a  poet  of  nature,  Annette  von 
Droste-Hiilshoff  saw  with  unerring  truth,  a  truth  that  is 
never  blinded  by  human  sentiments  or  emotions.  Her 
Westphalian  Haidebilder  are  as  unforgettable  as  Lenau's ; 
and  in  Das  geistliche  Jahr,  which  was  not  published  until 
after  her  death  (1851),  she  has  written  the  finest  German 
y  of  the  nineteenth  century. 


231 


CHAPTER    XXL 

THE    END    OF    ROMANTICISM. 

LIKE  all  literary  movements,  Romanticism  passed  through 
the  various  stages  of  organic  growth  ;  its  tentative  begin- 
nings were  followed  by  the  soaring  idealism  of  youth, 
and  this  in  turn  gave  place  to  the  definite  and  practical 
aims  of  maturity.  It  now  remains  for  us  to  consider  the 
disintegration  and  decay  of  the  movement.  From  the 
very  first  there  were  elements  of  an  abnormal  and  un- 
healthy character  in  German  Romanticism,  and  the  germs 
of  decadence  may  be  traced  back  to  the  very  inception 
of  Romantic  ideas  in  the  first  Romantic  School.  The 
ultimate  dissolution  was  brought  about  by 'the  one-sided 
development  of  certain  tendencies,  vby  the  increasing 
mediocrity  of  the  literature  itself,  and,  above  all^Jby  the 
change  in  the  general  thought  of  the  nation,  which  became 
unfavourable  and  even  antagonistic  to  Romanticism. 

The  decay  of  Romanticism  set  in  most  conspicuously 
in  the  centre  where  it  was  born,  in  Berlin.  Here,  as  we 
have  seen,  Brentano  and  Arnim  settled  after  they  left 
Heidelberg,  and,  for  a  time,  the  literary  circles  of  the 
capital,  which  were  at  least  unanimous  in  their  admiration 
of  Goethe,  afforded  a  favourable  soil  for  the  Romantic 
ideas.  Eichendorff,  who  was  associated  with  this  Berlin 
phase  of  Romanticism,  was  a  lyric  poet  of  the  first 
rank,  and  Chamisso's  perfect  sincerity  lent  strength  to 
his  genius.  But  mediocrity  began  to  creep  in  with  the 
work  of  the  most  popular  novel  -  writer  of  the  circle, 
Friedrich  de  la  Motte  Fouque  (1777-1843).  In  his  many 


232 


THE    END    OF    ROMANTICISM. 


novels  un  themes  of  chivalry  and  on  subjects  drawn  from 
northern  mythology  and  saga,  Fouque  illustrates  the 
clanger  to  which  Romantic  fiction  was  peculiarly  exposed, 
that  of  falling  back  into  the  manner  of  the  "  Ritterroman  " 
of  the  later  "  Sturm  und  Drang."  Deficient  in  the 
psychological  insight  of  the  more  gifted  Romanticists^ 
Fouque  is  satisfied  to  people  his  books  with  crudely 
drawn  ^conventional  figures,  and  he  has  recourse  in  his 
treatment  of  incident  and  motive  only  too  readily  to 
the  supernatural.  His  novels,  such  as  Der  Zauberring 
(1813)  and  Die  Fahrten  Thiodulfs  des  Islanders  (1815), 
which,  no  doubt,  responded  to  a  need  of  their  time,  are 
long  forgotten.  Fouque  only  lives  to-day  by  two  shorter 
stories,  Undine  (1811),  a  charming  fairy-tale  of  a  water- 
sprite,  who  by  virtue  of  her  marriage  with  a  mortal 
becomes  endowed  with  a  soul,  but  who  is  ultimately 
lured  back  to  her  native  element ;  and  the  hardly  less 
charming  Sintram  und  seine  Gefiihrten  (1814).  It  is  here 
that  Fouque's  talent,  not  very  strong  at  the  best,  is  seen 
to  most  advantage. 

J5ut  Jthe  master-novelist  of  this  period  of  Romantic 
decay  is  without  question  Ernst  Theodor  Wilhelm  —  or 
Amadeus,  as  he  called  himself  in  honour  of  Mozart — 
Hoffmann.  Born  at  Konigsberg  in  1776,  Hoffmann  was 
educated  at  the  university  of  his  native  town  with  a  view 
to  a  legal  career;  he  held,  between  1796  and  1800, 
official  posts  in  Glogau,  Berlin,  and  Posen.  In  the  last 
mentioned  town  his  satirical  talents  got  him  into  difficulties, 
and  he  was  virtually  exiled  to  Plozk,  a  small  town  on  the 
Vistula.  Later  we  find  him  in  Warsaw,  where  he  re- 
mained until  1806,  when  the  occupation  of  that  city  by 
the  French  deprived  him  of  his  post.  He  had  a  decided 
talent  for  music,  which  in  those  years  had  been  the  chief 
occupation  of  his  leisure  time,  and  now  he  resolved  to 
make  it  his  profession.  He  obtained  the  position  of 
conductor  of  the  theatre-orchestra  in  Bamberg.  With  a 
view  of  eking  out  his  meagre  income,  he  turned  to  litera- 
ture, and  with  his  first  book,  Phantasiestiicke  in  Callots 
Manier  (1814-15),  to  which  Jean  Paul  Friedrich  Richter 


E.    T.    A.    HOFFMANN.  233 

wrote  the  preface,  he  attracted  more  attention  than  he 
had  ever  done  by  his  compositions.  Callot,  it  should 
be  added,  was  a  French  artist  of  the  early  seventeenth 
century,  whose  imagination  had  much  in  common  with 
Hoffmann's.  The  grotesqueness  of  the  Phantasiestiicke 
is,  however,  of  quite  a  different  order  from  the  more 
sentimental  humour  of  Richter,  by  whom  Hoffmann  was 
naturally  influenced;  his  style,  too,  is  much  more  vivid 
and  concise,  and  his  outlook  on  life,  although  Romantic 
enough,  is  free  from  eighteenth-century  pathos  and  senti- 
jnent.  In  1814  Hoffmann  was  again  in  Berlin,  where 
he  obtained  an  official  position  in  connection  with  the 
law  courts.  He  was  soon  the  heart  and  soul  of  the 
literary  circles  of  the  Prussian  capital,  and  Fouque  and 
Chamisso  were  for  a  time  his  closest  friends ;  but  he 
lacked  balance,  and  gradually  slipped  into  a  life  of  dis- 
sipation which  brought  his  career  to  a  premature  end 
in  1822. 

"Hoffmann's  stories  fall  into  several  well-defined  groups. 
Best  known  are  those  in  which  the  fantastic  side  of  his 
imagination  is  allowed  to  run  riot :  gruesome  tales  which 
depend  for  their  horrors  on  the  supernatural.  To  this 
group  belongs  the  novel,  Die  Elixiere  des  Teufels  (1815-16), 
a  powerful  story  of  a  Capuchin  monk  who  tastes  of  a 
mysterious  elixir  preserved  among  the  reliques  of  his 
monastery,  with  the  consequence  that  he  is  driven  from 
one  crime  and  one  horror  to  another,  to  end  ultimately 
in  contrition  and  repentance.  We  have  obviously  here 
the  old  tale  of  terror,  as  it  was  cultivated  by  Monk 
Lewis  in  England,  and  by  Lewis's  models,  the  successors 
of  the  "  Sturm  und  Drang  "  in  Germany ;  but  it  is  told 
with  a  power  of  plastic  presentment  and  a  realism  which 
none  of  the  older  German  writers  had  at  their  command. 
To  the  same  group  of  stories  belong  most  of  the  Nacht- 
stiicke  (1817),  where  mysterious  "  Doppelganger  "  and  still 
more  gruesome  automata  which  come  to  life,  cause  even 
more  of  a  shudder  than  the  Teufels  Elixiere.  This  class 
of  story,  which  was  really  only  representative  of  one 
period  of  Hoffmann's  work,  culminates  in  the  morbid 


234  THE    END    OF    ROMANTICISM. 

novel  of  Klein  Zaches,  genannt  Zinnober  (1819).  Zaches 
is  an  "  Alraune,"  that  weird  goblin  of  German  folklore, 
which  was  dug  up  at  the  base  of  a  gallows ;  and  he 
upsets  the  moral  order  of  the  world  by  taking  credit  for 
the  good  that  others  do,  while  throwing  on  to  other 
people's  shoulders  the  responsibility  of  his  own  misdeeds. 
The  story  has  more  than  its  share  of  morbid  horrors,  but 
it  is  only  fair  to  say  that  it  does  not  depend  for  its  sole  or 
even  main  interest  on  the  supernatural. 

To  Hoffmann's  second  period  belong  a  number  of 
admirable  stories,  in  which  the  supernatural  plays  either 
no  role  at  all,  or  at  best  a  very  subordinate  one.  These 
were  introduced  by  Das  Majorat,  one  of  the  Nachtstiicke, 
and  they  make  up  the  greater  part  of  the  volumes  that 
are  entitled  Die  Serapionsbriider  (1819-21).  As  the  best 
stories  of  this  group  may  be  mentioned  Der  Arttishof, 
Meister  Martin  der  Kufner  und  seine  Gesellen,  and  Hoff- 
mann's masterpiece,  Das  Frdulein  von  Scuderi.  In  the 
last  group  of  Hoffmann's  work,  of  which  the  representa- 
tive novel  is  the  unfinished  Lebensansichten  des  Katers 
Murr  nebst  fragment arischer  Biographic  des  Kapellmeisters 
Johannes  Kreisler  in  zufdlligen  Makulaturbldttern  (1820- 
22),  a  reversion  may  be  detected  to  Richter's  peculiar 
form  of  humour,  namely,  a  humour  that  is  reflective,  senti- 
mental and,  although  not  free  from  exaggeration,  rarely 
grotesque.  The  hero  of  Kater  Murr,  which,  no  doubt, 
contains  some  of  Hoffmann's  maturest  writing,  is  a  cat,  and 
the  cat  is  assumed  to  write  its  life  and  opinions  on  the 
proofs  of  Kreisler's  autobiography,  the  whole  being  printed 
and  bound  up  together.  Strong,  vivid,  and  powerful  as 
Hoffmann's  work  is — and  Germany  possessed  no  greater 
master  of  fiction  in  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century 
— it  belongs,  none  the  less,  to  a  period  in  which  Roman- 
ticism had  outlived  itself;  the  delicate  touches  of  the 
great  Romantic  art  are  still  there,  but  the  morbid  exagger- 
ation and  extravagance  with  which  the  themes  are  treated 
is  an  unmistakable  sign  of  decadence. 

Although  not  in  the  same  sense  indicative  of  decay  as 
Hoffmann's  novels,  the  stories  which  one  of  the  leaders  of 


THE    HISTORICAL    NOVEL. 


235 


the  first  Romantic  School,  Ludwig  Tieck,  wrote  about  the 
same  time,  bear  testimony  to  the  change  that  had  come 
over  Romantic  ideas  in  the  space  of  little  more  than  twenty 
years.  Tieck's  many  Novelkn,  written  between  1821  and 
1840,  his  excellent  historical  story,  Der  Aufni/ir  in  den 
Cevennen  (1826),  and  the  interesting  novel  on  the  lines  of 
Wilhelm  Meister,  Der  junge  Tischlermeister  (1836),  are  in 
workmanship  superior  to  his  early  books,  but  the  old 
Romantic  idealism  appears  a  little  incongruous  in  an  age 
that  had  come  through  the  political  realities  of  the  rise 
and  fall  of  Napoleon. 

The  most  promising  form  of  Romantic  fiction  was 
undoubtedly  the  historical  novel ;  and  there  seemed  every 
prospect  that  Germany  would  at  this  time  build  up  a 
national  historical  fiction  on  the  basis  which  writers  like 
Arnim  had  prepared.  But  this  hope  reckoned  without  the*' 
influence  of  Scott,  who  held  all  Europe  under  his  spell ; 
the  German  writers  had  no  option  but  to  abandon  their  old 
models  and  learn  anew  from  the  Waverley  Novels.  This 
was  the  case  with  the  two  chief  authors  of  historical  fiction 
at  this  time,  Wilhelm  Hauff,  who  has  already  been 
mentioned,  and  W.  H.  Haring  (1798-1871),  known  to 
literature  as  "  Willibald  Alexis."  The  former  belongs  t^jf 
this  category  by  virtue~bF  his  Lichtenstein  (1826),  which, 
if  anything,  errs  by  excessive  indebtedness  to  its  models. 
Alexis  deserves  more  careful  attention,  for,  although  deeply 
influenced  by  Scott,  he  did  succeed  in  creating  a  distinctly 
original  type  of  novel  for  Prussia.  He  began  his  career 
not  merely  as  an  imitator  of  Scott,  but  even  passed  off 
his  first  books  as  actual  translations  of  Scott.  He  soon, 
however,  outgrew  this  dependence,  and  in  1832  appeared 
his  first  important  novel,  Cabanis,  a  story  of  the  time  of 
Frederick  the  Great.  Between  1840  and  1856  followed 
a  series  of  six  novels  from  national  Prussian  history  (Der 
Roland  von  Berlin,  1840  ;  Der  falsche  Waldcmar,  1842  : 
Die  Hosen  des  Herrn  von  Bredow,  1846-48  ;  Ruhe  ist  die 
erste  Biirgerpflicht,  1852;  Isegrimm,  1852,  and  Dorothea, 
1856),  on  which  his  reputation  as  a  master  of  the  German 
historical  novel  rests.  From  Scott  he  has  borrowed  the 


236  THE    END    OF    ROMANTICISM. 

power  of  vivifying  the  historical  details  of  a  past  age,  but 
he  did  not,  like  Scott's  other  imitators,  copy  slavishly  the 
technical  details  of  his  master.  His  originality  is  to 
be  seen  in  hfs  more  modern,  matter-of-fact  method  of 
presenting  his  story,  although,  unfortunately,  there  still 
clings  to  him  that  old  failing  of  the  German  Romantic 
movement,  the  want  of  clear,  plastic  outlines.  His  books 
are  consequently  not  as  interesting  to  read  as  their  sub- 
jects might  lead  us  to  expect.  Apart  from  these  two 
writers,  the  historical  novel  stood  high  in  favour  in 
Germany  in  the  early  nineteenth  century.  Der,  Jude 
(1827),  by  Karl  _Spindler  (1796-1855),  was  one  of  "the 
better  novels  orthis~clas? ;  and  Heinrich  Zschokke  (1771- 
1848)  endeavoured  in  his  Btider \jaus^er_Sclm)eizj(i?>2^- 
26)  to  do  for  Switzerland  what  Scott  had  done  for 
Scotland  in  his  Waverley  Novels.  Zschokke  was  a  native 
of  Magdeburg,  but  a  Swiss  by  adoption.  His  earliest 
book,  AballinO)  der  grosse  Bandit  (1794),  was  a  popular 
example  of  the  pre-Romantic  robber-stories  which  owed 
their  origin  to  Schiller's  Rduber.  He  might  be  described 
as  the  first  writer  who  put  forward  the  Swiss  point  of  view, 
and  is  thus  the  forerunner  of  Gotthelf  and  Keller.  This 
peculiarly  Swiss  quality  is,  however,  more  evident  in 
his  pedagogic  novel,  Das  Goldmacherdorf  (\&\']\  and  in 
the  devotional  poems  of  his  Stunden  der  Andacht  (1809- 
16),  than  in  his  historical  Swiss  stories. 

The  Romantic  spirit,  chilled  by  the  sober  realism  of 
the  new  epoch,  sought  refuge  in  the  poetry  of  the  East; 
it  was  Goethe,  who  here,  with  his  Westostliche  Divan, 
pointed  out  the  way.  The  master  of  German  oriental 
poetry  is  Friedrich  Riickert  (1788-1866),  who  began  with 
"his"  Geharnischte  Sonette  (1814)  as  a  patriotic  poet  of  the 
War  of  Liberation.  He  soon,  however,  outgrew  this 
mood,  and  under  the  influence  of  the  Viennese  orientalist, 
J.  von  Hammer-Purgstall,  became  an  ardent  student  of 
oriental  poetry.  The  poems  of  his  Ostliche  Rosen  (1822) 
were,  like  Goethe's  Divan,  inspired  by  Hafiz,  and  in  the 
following  year  Riickert  published  a  large  number  of  trans- 
lations of  Eastern  literature.  Chief  of  these  are  the 


RUCKERT  AND  SCHULZE.          237 

Makamen  of  Hariri  (1826-37),  the  merry  adventures  of  an 
Arabian  rogue,  the  Sanskrit  Nal  und  Damajanti  (1828), 
the  Chinese  Schi-King  (1833),  the  Persian  ^Rostem  utid 
Suhrab  (1838),  and  a  collection  of  the  oldest  Arabian 
"Volkslieder,  Die  Hamasa  (1846).  His  longest  and  most 
ambitious  reproduction  of  oriental  poetry  is  Die  Weishcit 
dcs  Brahnianen  (6  volumes,  1836-39),  a  didactic  poem, 
"or  rather  collection  of  didactic,  aphoristic  verse.  Apart 
from  his  oriental  work,  Riickert  belongs  with  his  Liebes- 
frilhling  (1834)  and  Haus-  und  Jahreslieder  (1832-38)  to 
the  group  of  Romantic  lyric  poets  which  includes  Eichen- 
dorff  and  Chamisso  ;  his  lyric  vein  is  akin  to  theirs,  but 
he  is  lacking  in  their  concentration  ;  his  verse  came  too 
easily  and  is  correspondingly  diffuse.  As  he  became  more 
immersed  in  oriental  studies,  he  showed  a  tendency  to 
introduce  exaggerated  imagery  and  far-fetched  metaphors 
"Into  his  German  poetry.  But  Riickert  remains  with 
Platen  one  of. .the  great  verse  artists  in  German  poetry  ;  his 
wealth  of  rhythmic  form  is  inexhaustible.  Romanticism 
in  its  decay  is  also  to  be  seen  in  the  work  of  E.  K.  F. 
Schulze  (1789-1817),  whose  two  epics  Catilie  and  Die 
l>ezauberte  Rose  (both  1818)  stand  out  as  isolated  produc- 
tions in  an  age  that  cared  but  little  for  the  allegorical  epic. 
At  times  Schulze  reminds  us  of  Wieland,  but  he  was  too 
much  of  a  Romanticist  to  have  sympathy  for  the  latter's 
lighter  tone ;  and  his  brief  life  was  wholly  overshadowed 
by  the  death  of  a  woman  for  whom  he  cherished  an  almost 
morbid  passion. 

A  more  significant  transformation  of  the  Romantic 
spirit  is  to  be  seen  in  the  active  sympathy  of  a  number 
"of  the  younger  poets  for  the  struggle  for  liberty  then  acute 
IrTGreece  and  Poland ;  for  the  second  time  in  its  history, 
"we  might  say,  Romanticism  placed  itself  at  the  service  of 
a  great  political  ideal.  Byron,  of  course,  was  here  a 
leader  and  example.  Among  the  champions  of  Greek 
independence  in  Germany  the  chief  was  Wilhelm  Miiller 
(7794-1827),  a  native  of  Dessau,  whose  Liedcr  der 
Griechen  (1821-24)  awoke  a  warm  echo  in  German  hearts. 
To  the"modern  reader  these  songs,  seem  monotonous  : 


238  THE    END    OF    ROMANTICISM. 

their  reiterated  sentimental  patriotism  rings  a  little  false ; 
but  no  such  criticism  can  be  brought  against  Miiller's 
unpolitical  lyric.  Here  he  appears  as  a  poet  in  many 
ways  akin  to  Chamisso ;  in  his  love  poetry  especially  he 
has  the  same  power  of  simple,  direct  utterance,  perhaps 
also  the  same  limited  horizon.  His  MulkrUeder^  a  cycle 
of  love  songs,  the  most  popular  of  all  his  verses,  gives 
voice  even  more  precisely  than  Chamisso's  love  poetry  to 
the  unsophisticated  emotion  of  the  German  "  Volk."  In 
his  Wander lieder,  again,  there  are  points  of  similarity_with 
Eichendorff ;  and  his  sea  poetry — most  original  of  all— 
no  doubt  influenced  Heine's.  His  first  collection  of 
purely  lyric  poetry  appeared  in  1821  under  the  title 
Gedichte  aus  den  hinterlassenen  Papieren  eines  reisenden 
Waldhornisten,  a  second  volume  appearing  in  1824;  his 
sea  poetry  is  to  be  found  in  the  beautiful  cycles,  Muscheln 
von  der  Insel  Riigen  (1825)  and  Lieder  aus  dem  Meerbusen 
von  Salerno  (1827).  In  estimating  Miiller's  contributions 
to  the  storehouse  of  German  lyric  poetry  it  must  not 
be  forgotten  that  he  was  cut  off  at  the  early  age  of 
twenty-nine.  The  Byronic  fever  and  the  Byronic  enthusi- 
asm for  suppressed  nationalities  are  to  be  traced  in  most 
German  poets  of  this  epoch,  in  F.  von  Gaudy  (1800-40), 
Chamisso's  friend  and  the  German  translator  of  Beranger, 
and  in  Julius  Mosen  (1803-67),  whose  many  novels  and 
Romantic  dramas,  but  rarely  read  now,  mark  the  gradual 
tapering-off  of  the  Romantic  literature.  Nor  must  it  be 
forgotten  that  one  of  the  greater  German  poets  of  this 
epoch,  August  von  Platen,  also  wrote  a  series  of  noble 
Polenlieder  (1830-33). 

August,  Graf  von  Flaten-Mallermiinde  (1796-1835),  a 
native  of  Ansbach,  occupies  a  solitary  position  in  the 
literature  of  the  age.  He,  too,  was  a  Romanticist,  but 
li  "Romanticist  'who  realised,  and  felt  keenly  the  degenera- 
tion of  the  Romantic  movement ;  his  poetry  might  be 
described  as  an  effort,  perhaps  only  vaguely  conscious,  to 
stay  the  decay  of  Romanticism,  He  began,  like  Riickert, 
with  Ghaselen  (1821),  imitations  of  the  orientalism  of  the 
Westbstliche  Divan,  and  the  materials  for  his  last  epic. 


PLATEN    AND    IMMERMANN.  239 

Die  Abbasiden  (1834),  also  came  from  the  East.  It 
was,  moreover,  a  genuine  Romantic  impulse  that  led  him 
to  dramatise  the  popular  fairy-tale  in  Die  gltiserne  Pantoffel 
(1824).  On  the  other  hand,  no  one  poured  out  more  con- 
temptuous scorn  on  the  degenerate  Romanticists  of  the  day 
than  did  Platen  in  his  Die  verhdngnisvolle  Gabel  (1826), 
and  in  Per  romantische  Oedipus  (1829),  in  which  Immer- 
mann  came  in  for  the  main  share  of  the  blows.  In  these 
plays  Platen  reveals  himself  as  a  powerful  satirist,  although 
TTis  satire  was  limited  to  literary  matters.  The  regenera- 
TTon  of  Romantic  poetry  he  sought  in  Italy,  which  from 
1826  on  he  made  his  home.  He  adapted  to  German 
"needs  the  metres  and  rhythms  of  Romance  literature,  and 
attained  a  mastery  of  form  and  purity  of  classical  expres- 
sion which  even  Goethe  in  his  most  classic  days  did 
not  surpass.  In  a  higher  degree  than  Goethe's  antique 
measures,  Platen's  poetry  lays  itself  open  to  the  reproach 
of  coldness ;  no  German  poet,  indeed,  so  completely 
expunged  the  personal  and  subjective  element  from  his 
poetry  as  Platen  did.  With  all  his  coldness,  however,  he 
remains  the  supreme  artist  of  form  among  German  poets ; 
his  Sonette  aus  Venedig  (1825)  are  the  finest  sonnets  in 
the  German  tongue.  Although  born  into  an  age  of 
decadence,  he  has  left  his  stamp  upon  the  poetic  language 
of  the  Germans  as  no  other;  _he  vindicated  for  the  last 
time  the  high  ideals  of  the  first  Romantic  School. 

The  last  of  the  Romanticists  was  Karl  Leberecht 
Immermann,  who  was  born  at  Magdeburg  in  1796  and 
died  in  1840 — the  last,  not  chronologically,  but  by  his 
qualities  as  a  writer ;  he  stands,  it  might  be  said,  on  the 
borderland  between  Romanticism  and  the  movement  that 
succeeded  it.  He  experimented  in  every  form  of  Romantic 
poetry ;  he  wrote  dramas  in  the  style  of  Arnim,  of  Tieck, 
and  of  the  "  Schicksalsdramatiker."  His  Trauerspiel  in 
Tirol  (1828)  is  an  imposing  tragedy,  with  Andreas  Hofer 
as  hero ;  his  Alexis  (1832),  a  trilogy  based  on  the  history 
of  Peter  the  Great;  while  jn  Merlin  (1832)  he  created,  if 
not  a  drama  for  the  stage,  a  dramatic  poem  of  singular 
beauty,  an  essentially  Romantic  variant  of  the  classical 


240  THE    END    OF    ROMANTICISM. 

Faust  theme.  Merlin  in  this  modern  mystery  is  a  kind 
oT  Antichrist,  in  whom  Immermann  has  embodied  the 
distraughtness  of  his  own  age,  the  conflict  of  the  Romantic 
soul  between  renunciation  and  happiness.  Immerrnarm 
has  left  a  deeper  mark  on  his  time  as  a  novelist  than  as 
ITctfarriatist.  As  the  author  of  the  romance  Die  Epigonen 
(1836),  he  has  thrown  off  his  exclusive  allegiance" "to 
Romanticism  and  stands  out  as  the  pioneer  of  that  new 
fiction  which  was  to  dominate  German  literature  through- 
out the  last  third  of  the  century.  Nowhere,  indeed,  is 
Jp__be_seen  more  clearly  than  in  this  novel  the  transT^ 
tion  from  the  Romantic  novel/"  inspired  by  Wilhelm 
AfetsTer,  to  the  new  fiction  of  social  problems.  Without 
any  very  clearly  planned  plot,  Die  Epigonen  is  a  veiled 
biography  of  the  author  himself ;  for  he,  too,  felt  bitterly 
that  he  was  only  an  "  Epigone,"  "  late-born "  in  an  age 
that  was  rapidly  passing  away.  Immermann's  second 
romance,  Miinchhausen,  eine  GeschicJiW~in  ~Arabesken,  ap- 
peared TrTr 838-39,"~and  in  form  is  a  relapse  into  the 
Romantic,  or  more  specifically,  Richterian  confusion. 
It  might  be  described  as  a  receptacle  for  Immermann's 
own  likes  and  dislikes,  his  frank  opinions  of  his  time ; 
but  he  had  neither  the  imagination  nor  the  humour  which, 
as  so  often  in  Jean  Paul's  case,  make  up  for  the  confused 
formlessness  of  the  whole.  In  Miinchhausen,  however, 
there  lies  embedded  a  short  story  of  German  peasant 
lifeT  Per  jQberhof,  which  is  a  masterpiece  of  its  kind. 
Here,  again,  Immermann,  "Epigone"  although  he  was, 
was  building  for  the  future  ;  his  Oberhof'^  the  first  modern 
peasant-story  in  European  literature,  and  the  forerunner 
of  a  vast  literature  of  the  peasant,  in  which  the  German 
"writers  of  the  next  generation  were  peculiarly  to  excel. 
Immermann's  last  work  of  importance  was  a  modernisation 
of  Tristan  und  Isolde  (published  1841),  which  he  did  not 
live  to  finish.  As  director  of  the  theatre  in  Diisseldorf, 
where  he  had  settled  as  Landgerichtsrat  in  1827,  he  con- 
tributed in  no  small  degree  to  the  artistic  and  literary 
development  of  the  German  theatre. 


241 


CHAPTER    XXII. 

YOUNG    GERMANY    AND    THE    POLITICAL    LYRIC. 

THE__group  of  writers  known  as  "  Young  Germany " 
represents  the  complete  antithesis  to  the  Romantic  move- 
ment. That  ideal,  unworldly  spirit  which,  in  spite  of 
patriotic  zeal  and  national  aims,  clung  to  the  Romantic 
poets^  to  the  last,  here  gives  place  to  a  p_racticaj  material- 
ism ; "the  individualism  and  the  lyricism  of  Romanticism 
are  discarded  for  social  philosophies  and  politics ;-"  and 
"tHese  find  their  natural"  ntlrary  outlet  in  the  newspaper- 
yeuilleton  and  the  social  novel.  The  change  had  been 
due  partly  to  the  broadly  collective  tendencies  in-^Hegel's 
philosophy,  partly  to  the  less  healthy  influence  of  Saint- 
Simon  ;  partly,  too,  to  theMisappointment  of  the  German 
people  in  their  hopes  of  becoming,  as  a  consequence  of 
the  national  rising  against  Napoleon,  a  great  free  nation. 
The  political  fiasco  of  the  first  half  of  the  century  destroyed 
all  faith  in  the  wider  issues  of  Romanticism,  and  the  new 
generation  felt  that  nothing  was  to  be  achieved  by  that 
form  of  nationalism  which  found  its  expression  in  the 
Romantic  literature.  The  new  watchword  was  cosmo- 
politanism, and  the  ideal^  of  the  "Young  German"  was 
to  approximate  as  much  as  possible  his  mode  of  thinking 
and  writing  to  that  of  the  French. 

That  France  was  the  saviour  of  Europe  was  first  realised 
by  the  disheartened  German  patriots  at  the  Revolu- 
tion of  1830,  and  the  literary  group  of  "  Jungdeutsch- 
land"  may  be  said^To""have  taken  its  origin  from  that 
event.  Phrases  like  "  Young  Germany  "  were  in  the  air 

Q 


242  YOUNG   GERMANY. 

at  the  time ;  and  in  the  dedication  of  a  volume  of  ad- 
vanced literary  criticism,  Asthetische  Feldziige,  published 
in  1834,  Ludolf  Wienbarg  (1802-72),  a  "  privatdocent  "  in 
the  university  of  Kiel,  wrote  :  "  Dir,  junges  Deutschland, 
nicht  dem  alten,  widme  ich  diese  Reden."  In  the  follow- 
ing year  a  review  was  projected,  which  was  to  have  borne 
this  title.  Before,  however,  the  first  number  appeared, 
the  German  Bundestag  issued  a_decre§,  dated  December 
10,  1835,  which  ordered  the  suppression  of  the  literary 
school  "known  under  the  name  of  Young  Germany,"  and 
mentioned  expressly  the  names  of  Heinrich  Heine,  Karl 
Gutzkow,  Ludolf  Wienbarg,  Theodor  Mundt,  and  Hein- 
rich Laube. 

Of  these  men  the  first,  Heine,  was  the  oldest,  and 
exemplifies  most  clearly  the  transition  from  Romanticism 
to  "Young  Germany,"  for  Heine  learned  his  art  in  the 
school  of  Romanticism,  and,  in  spite  of  all  later  political 
enthusiasms  and  French  veneer,  he  remained  at  heart  a 
Romantic  poet  to  the  last.  Heinrich,  or  rather  Harry, 
Heine  was  born  at  Diisseldorf,  of  Jewish  parentage,  on 
December  13,  1797.  Originally  intended  for  a  com- 
mercial career,  he  turned,  with  the  support  of  his  uncle, 
a  wealthy  Hamburg  banker,  to  the  study  of  law,  and 
spent  several  years  at  the  universities  of  Bonn,  Gottingen, 
and  Berlin.  In  Berlin  he  was  taken  up  by  the  literary 
coteries  and  published  his  first  volume  of  Gedichte  (1822), 
as  well  as  two  dramas,  Almansor  and  William  Ratcliff 
(1823).  It  was  not,  however,  until  the  Harzreise Ap- 
peared in  1826,  the  description  of  a  "  sentimental "  tour 
made  in  the  Harz  Mountains  in  1824,  that  general 
attention  was  attracted  to  him.  This  book  formed,  together 
with  two  cycles  of  poems,  Die  Heimkehr  and  Die  Nordsee, 
the  first  volume  of  the  Reisebilder.  In  1827  appeared  his 
Buck  der  Lieder,  which  caused  an  enormous  stir  and  made 
"Heine  at  once  the  most  popular  poet  of  Germany.  The 
novelty  of  the  book  was  due  to  the  fact  that  it  combines 
with  an  unsurpassed  felicity  of  lyric  expression  a  boldness,, 
of  imagery  which  was  foreign  to  the  Romantic  lyric  poets 
of  the  earlier  period,  and  occasionally  a  biting  irony. 


HEINRICH    HEINE.  243 

This  irony  with  which  Heine  regarded  himself,  his 
scathing  gibes  at  his  own  emotions  were,  in  themselves, 
a  negation  of  the  intense  sincerity  of  the  Romantic  lyric  ; 
the  spirit  of  self-criticism,  for  such  it  is  when  reduced  to  its 
ultimate,  elements,  was  quite  in  harmony  with  the  anti- 
romantic  tendencies  of  European  letters  in  the  epoch 
between  the  Revolutions  of  1830  and  1848.  It  perhaps 
also  explains  why  Heine's  claims  to  greatness  should  have 
been  more  readily  conceded  by  other  nations  than  by  his 
own.  Germany,  being  closely  identified  with  the  spirit  of 
Romanticism,  was  correspondingly  less  accessible  to  the 
new  materialism,  and  resented  Heine's  irony  and  apparent 
insincerity  as  a  wanton  offence  against  her  great  poetic 
traditions.  But  the  Buck  der  Lieder  stands  out,  notwith- 
standing, as,  with  the  possible  exception  of  Des  Knaben 
Wunderhorn,  the  most  widely  influential  collection  of 
lyric  poetry  of  the  nineteenth  century.  Heine  made  the 
German  lyric  cosmopolitan,  just  as  Byron,  a  few  decades 
earlier,  had  made  English  poetry  the  common  posses- 
sion of  Europe. 

In  the  same  year  as  the  Buck  der  Lieder  Heine  pub- 
lished the  second  part  of  his  Reisebilder,  which  contained, 
besides  a  continuation  of  Die  Nordsee,  Das  Buck  Le  Grand; 
a  third  volume  (Reise  von  Miinchen  nach  Gemea,  Die 
Bdder  von  Lucca)  appeared  in  1830,  a  fourth  (Die  Stadt 
Lucca,  Englische  Fragmente)  in  1831.  In  his  Nordsee 
lyrics  Heine  struck  perhaps  the  freshest  note  of  all,  for  he 
"IFthe  only  German  poet  who  has  felt  to  the  full  the  magic 
and  the  mystery  of  the  sea.  In  1831  Heine  made  Paris 
Jus  home,  where  he  supported  himself  as  correspondent 
for  German  newspapers,  and  worked  in  the  interests  of 
the  Young  German  party  with  which  the  government 
decree  had  associated  him.  His  warm  sympathy  for 
France  also  commended  him  to  the  French  government, 
which,  from  1836  to  1848,  provided  him  with  a  pension. 
In  the  winter  of  1834-35  Heine  made  the  acquaintance 
of  Eugenie  Mirat,  a  French  shop-girl  who,  years  later, 
became  his  wife;  kind  and  good-natured,  Mathilde,  as 
he  called  her,  was  entirely  without  understanding  for  her 


244  YOUNG    GERMANY. 

husband's  genius,  and  dragged  him  down  rather  than 
helped  him.  His  prose  writings  in  these  years,  apart 
from  journalistic  feuilletons  on  French  affairs  (Pranzosische 
Zustdnde,  1833;  Der  Salon,  1834-40;  Lutezia,  1854), 
were  not  of  a  kind  to  win  him  friends  in  Germany ;  Die 
romantische  Schule.  (1836)  is  disfigured  by  tasteless  per- 
sonalities, Ludwig  Borne  (1840)  is  an  attack  on  one 
who  in  life  had  been  his  friend.  The  biting  satire  of 
Deutschland,  ein  Wintermdrchen  (1844)  was  even  less 
to  German  taste.  But  there  is  something  of  the  magic 
of  the  old  Romantic  spirit  in  Atta  Troll,  ein  Sommernacht- 
straum  (1847,  but  written  in~i84i),  which  Heine  him- 
self called  the  "  swan-song  of  the  Romantik  "  ;  nowhere, 
indeed,  is  Heine's  genius  seen  to  better  advantage  than 
in  this,  the  most  original  poem  of  the  whole  age.  One 
forgets,  amid  the  Romantic  surroundings  of  the  story  of 
the  Pyrenean  dancing  bear  which,  escaping  from  its  keeper, 
finds  refuge  in  the  romantic  vale  of  Roncevaux,  that 
the  poem  is  merely  an  allegorical  veil  covering  a  satire 
on  the  political  poetry  of  the  day. 

In  1848  Heine  was  struck  down  by  a  terrible  disease 
of  the  spine,  which  condemned  him  to  a  "mattress-grave  " 
Jorjthe  last  eight  years  of  his  life,  and  in  these  years  he 
rose,  as  a  lyric  poet,  to  heights  he  had  never  reached 
before.  The  spirit  of  the  romances  and  lyrics  which 
make  up  the  collection  of  the  Romanzero^  ( 1 8  g  i ),  is  nobler 
and  more  sincere  than  the  sentimentality  and  irony  of 
the  Buck  der  Lieder.  The  strange  fantastic  love  for  the 
poetess,  Camilla  Selden,  who  nursed  him  in  his  last  years, 
completed  the  transformation  of  Heine  from  a  brilliant 
poet  of  genius  to  one  of  the  greatest  of  lyric  singers. 
The  poetry  of  his  closing  years  differs  from  that  of  the 
Jwige  Leiden,  as  the  conventional  roses  and  violets  of  that 
early  poetry  differ  from  the  large  white  passion-flower 
which  he  pictured  as  overshadowing  his  own  marble 
sarcophagus.  Heine  died  in  Paris  on  February  17, 
1856. 

Heine's  comrade  in  arms  in  his  battle  for  "  Young 
German  "  Liberalism  was  Ludwig  Borne,  or  to  give  him 


LUDWIG    B5RNE. 


245 


his  real  name,  Lob  Baruch.  He  was  considerably  older 
than  Heine,  having  been  born  in  the  Frankfort  ghetto  in 
1786,  and  he  died  in  Paris  in  1837.  Borne  was  not 
expressly  mentioned  in  the  decree  of  the  Bundestag 
suppressing  "  Young  Germany,"  but  his  influence  on  the 
movement  was  greater  than  Heine's.  Both  Heine  and 
Borne  suffered  under  the  brutal  persecution  to  which  their 
race  was  subjected,  both  turned  their  backs  on  Germany, 
and  found  in  Paris  the  new  Jerusalem,  a  home  of  spiritual 
freedom  and  progress  ;  and  yet  neither  was  able  to  wipe 
out  entirely  from  his  heart  a  strong  sentiment  of  affection 
for  his  hand-and-tongue-tied  German  compatriots.  Their 
peculiar  talents  were  the  complement  of  each  other. 
JBorne,  essentially  a  practical  man,  saw  political  reform 
from  its  practical  side,  while  Heine  indulged  in  visionary 
panegyrics  of  freedom.  Borne  became  the  greatest  jour- 
nalist of  the  "  Young  German  "  epoch,  Heine  its  greatest 
lyric  poet.  Like  Heine,  Borne  had  made  his  reputation 
in  Germany  before  the  Revolution  of  1830,  an  event 
which  both  writers  hailed  as  the  beginning  of  a  new  era. 
As  the  editor  of  various  periodicals,  the  chief  of  them 
being  Die  Wage  (1818-20),  Borne  had,  more  perhaps 
than  any  other  journalist  in  this  age,  influenced  and 
moulded  public  opinion ;  and  had  the  authorities  not 
kept  a  watchful  eye  on  him,  he  would  doubtless  have 
succeeded  in  kindling  in  his  countrymen  that  spirit  of 
revolt  which  was  to  lie  dormant  until  1848. 

In  1830,  weary  of  the  fruitless  struggle  against  the 
press-censorship,  Borne  found  his  way  to  Paris,  from 
which  he  wrote  the  originally  private  Brief e  aus  Paris. 
They  were  published  in  the  years  1830  and  1833,  and 
"as^a  natural  result  of  their  suppression  by  the  government, 
"were  read  with  avidity  throughout  Germany.  Borne 
here  attempted  to  show  Germany  herself  in  the  mirror  of 
French  events,  to  teach  her  the  part  she  ought  to  play  in 
the  glorious  war  which  France  was  waging  for  the  freedom 
of  humanity.  Although  more  a  document  of  the  time 
than  an  abiding  contribution  to  German  prose  literature, 
these  letters  mark  an  epoch  in  the  history  of  the  German 


246 


YOUNG    GERMANY. 


newspaper ;  jthey  reformed  German  prose,  and  taught  Ger- 
man journalists  a  brilliant,  witty,  and  incisive  prose  style. 
Apart  from  such  work,  Borne's  contributions  to  German 
literature  are  of  small  account.  His  literary  criticism  was 
limited  by  his  political  outlook  and  rarely  inspired  by 
purely  aesthetic  considerations.  The  democrat  in  him, 
for  instance,  sympathised  with  the  "  biirgerliche  "  humour 
and  sentiment  of  Jean  Paul,  and  rose  in  rebellion  against 
Goethe's  aristocratic  nature.  His  own  short  stories,  such 
as  Der  Narr  im  weissen  Schwan  and  Der  Esski'mstler 
(1822),  are  unimportant  and  represent  merely  another 
side  of  his  journalistic  activity. 

In  the  earlier  part  of  their  work  Borne  and  Heine  were 
virtually  predecessors  of  the  "Young  German"  movement. 
Tne  actual  leader  of  the  school  in  its  narrower  limits  was 
Karl  Gutzkow  (1811-78).  As  a  man  of  letters  Gutzkow 
was  the  immediate  product  of  the  July  Revolution,  for  it  was 
in  the  year  1830  that  his  thoughts  first  turned  to  a  literary 
career.  An  ironical  romance,  Maha  -  Guru,  Geschichte 
eines  Gottes,  appeared  in  1833  and  attracted  some  atten- 
tion, and  Wally  die  Zweiflerin  (1835)  ^rs^  made  his 
reputation.  This  appears  a  colourless  enough  novel  to 
us  now,  but  in  its  day  its  religious  scepticism  and  out- 
spoken tone  caused  great"~c>rTence,  and  cost  its  author 
three  months'  imprisonment.  Wally  die  Zweiflerin  is  the 
"  Young  German "  interpretation  of  the  theme  that 
Friedrich  Schlegel  had  treated  in  his  Lucinde,  and  it 
exerted  a  decisive  influence  on  the  fiction  of  the  time. 
Gutzkow's  best  work,  both  as  a  novelist  and  a  dramatist, 
belongs  to  a  later  period.  His  longer  novels,  of  which 
Blasedow  und  seine  S.ohne  (1838-39),  Die  Ritter  vom 
Geiste  (1850-52),  and  Der  Zauberer  von  Rom  (1858-61) 
are  the  most  important,  are  unwieldy  and  formless,  and  one 
and  all  "  Tendenzromane  "  or  "novels  with  a  purpose." 
But  Die  Ritter  vom  Geiste  is,  to  a  certain  extent,  the 
starting-point  for  the  modern  German  social  novel ;  it  is  an 
attempt  not  merely  to  tell  a  story,  but  also  to  reproduce 
an  entire  epoch,  the  reactionary  epoch  that  set  in  after  the 
failure  of  the  Revolution  of  1848.  The  actual  story, 


GUTZKOW  AND    LAUBE.  247 

however,  recalls  too  frequently  the  old   "family  novels" 
of   the    eighteenth  century    to   be  attractive    to   modern 
readers.       As  a  dramatist   Gutzkow   has  enjoyed    longer 
favour;  for  his  best  plays  are  still  occasionally  to  be  seen 
in  German  theatres.     Zopfund  Schwert  (1843)  is  an  effec- 
tive historical  comedy  of  the  court  of  Friedrich  Wilhelm  I. 
of  Prussia,  which  shows  the  influence  of  Scribe  and  of  the 
French  intrigue  comedy  of  the  time.     In  1847  he  pro- 
duced two  plays,  also   historical,   but  in  different  ways; 
Das  Urbild  des  Tartiiffe,  a  comedy  founded  on  an  incident 
in  Moliere's  life,  and  Uriel  Acosta,  a  blank-verse  tragedy, 
the  hero  of  which  is  Spinoza's  master  and  predecessor. 
The  popularity  of  the  latter  play  was,  however,  less  due  to 
its  poetic  qualities  than  to  its  bearing  on  the  question  of 
the  moment;    it   is  an  echo  of   the  conflict   that  raged 
round   D.    F.    Strauss's    Leben  Jesu,    a   kind   of  Nathan 
der    Weise  of  the    nineteenth    century.     Gutzkow's    last 
important  p\ay,J)er  Konigsleutnant  (1849),   is  a  drama- 
tisation, with  no   very   conscientious  adherence  to   facts, 
of  an  episode  in  Goethe's  boyhood  described  in  Dichtung 
und  Wahrheit,  and  was  written  for  the  Goethe  centenary 
in  1849. 

Heinrich  Laube  (1806-84),  a  native  of  Silesia,  was 
another  of  the  leaders  of  "Young  Germany,"  but  his  liter- 
ary work  had  even  jess  vitality  than  Gutzkow's^  He  con- 
tributed to  the  movement  volumes  of  essays  and  criticism, 
a  series  of  lengthy  novels  under  the  collective  title  Das 
junge  Europa  (1833-37),  in  which  the  ideas  of  the  time 
are  enunciated  and  advocated  with  the  warmth  of  a  special 
pleader;  unfortunately  the  form,  or  rather  formlessness  of 
the  novels,  makes  them  unreadable  to-day  except  as  docu- 
ments of  their  time.  There  is  even  less  vitality  in  the  six 
volumes  of  Reisenovellen,  which  he  published  between 
1834  and  1837  in  imitation  of  Heine.  His  chief  work  of 
fiction,  Der  deutsche  Krieg  (1863-66),  is  a  historical  novel 
in  nine  volumes, Healing  with  the  epoch  of  the  Thirty  Years' 
War,  and  in  a  realistic  manner  that  contrasts  sharply  with 
the  imaginative  standpoint  of  the  Romantic  writers.  J\s  a 
dramatist  Laube  was  an  avowed  enthusiast  for  the  French 


248  YOUNG   GERMANY. 

stage ;  he  translated  and  adapted  the  best  French  plays  of 
£Fe  day.  and  all  his  own  dramatic  work  has  the  stamp  of 
clever  French  workmanship.  Like  Gutzkow,  he  attained 
his  chief  success  with  a  comedy  on  a  literary  subject,  Die 
Karlsschiiler  (1847),  °f  which  the  young  Schiller  is  the 
rather  impossible  hero.  Like  Gutzkow,  too,  he  wrote 
historical  tragedies  in  blank  verse,  of  which  the  most  im- 
portant is  Graf  Essex  ( 1 8  5  6).  In  one  respect  Laube  has 
left  a  deep  mark  on  his  time ;  he  was  the  greatest  Ger- 
"mah  theatre-director  of  the  century.  For  twenty-five  years, 
from  1850  onwards,  he  controlled  the  fortunes  of  the 
German  stage,  first  as  director  of  the  Hofburgtheater  in 
Vienna,  then  of  the  Municipal  theatres  in  Leipzig,  and 
again  in  Vienna,  of  the  Stadttheater  there.  The  record 
of  his  work  in  this  field,  which  is  to  be  found  in  three 
volumes,  Das  Burgtheater  (1868),  Das  norddeutsche 
Theater  ( 1 8 7 2 ),  and  Das  Wiener  Stadttheater  (1875),  is 
the  part  of  his  writings  which  has  retained  its  value  and 
interest  longest. 

A  characteristic  member  of  the  "  Young  German  "  move- 
ment was  Theodor  Mundt  ( 1 808-6  r),  whose  Madonna* 
Unterhaltungen  mit  einer  Heiligen  created  hardly  less 
stir  in  1835  tnan  did  Wally  die  Zweifterin ;  for  here, 
too,  the  craving  for  emancipation  from  traditional  re- 
ligious orthodoxy  and  the  moral  conventions  of  the  day 
tound^venL  The  model  for  Mundt's  "Madonna "  was  a 
certain  Charlotte  Stieglit/.  who,  in  1834,  put  an  end  to 
her  life  in  the  hopes  that  a  great  sorrow  would  awaken 
the  poetic  genius  of  her  husband,  Heinrich  Stieglitz 
(1801-49).  But  it  must  be  confessed  that  that  poet's 
Bilder  des  Orients  (1831-33)  hardly  justify  his  wife's 
tragic  self-sacrifice.  More  interesting  than  Mundt  is 
Bettina  von  Arnim  (1785-1859),  who  has  already  been 
mentioneonSTan  earlier  chapter.  She  formed,  one  might 
say,  a  link  between  the  "  Young  German  "  movement  and 
the  Romantic  period.  She  had  sat  in  devout  adoration 
at  Goethe's  feet,  and  poured  out  her  soul  in  the  half- 
fictitious  Goethes  Briefwechsel  mit  einem  Kinde_(i%$4),  a 
book  that  has  not  unjustly  been  called  one  of  the  most 


THE    POLITICAL    LYRIC. 


249 


beautiful  of  the  whole  Romantic  movement.  She  wrote 
also  the  life  of  Karoline  von  Giinderode  (Die  Gimderode, 
1840),  the  unhappy  friend  of  Wilhelm  von  Humboldt, 
who  killed  herself  in  1806.  But  the  meeting  of  the 
waters  of  Romanticism  and  the  new  spirit  is  perhaps  seen 
best  of  all  in  Bettina  von  Arnim's  last  book,  which  bears 
the  fantastic  title,  Dies  Buck  gehort  dem  Konig  (1849); 
_here  she  lays  at  the  feet  of  the  romantically  minded  King 
of  Prussia  a  description  of  the  sufferings  of  the  industrial 
'•hisses  under  the  new  social  conditions,  a  book  of  liberal 
political  ideas  set  forth  with  Romantic  fervour. 

Just  as  the  Heidelberg  Romanticists  brought  the 
visionary  dreams  of  the  earlier  Romantic  School  to  a 
more  definite  focus,  so  now  the  movement  associated  with 
"  Young  Germany "  advanced  from  theories  to  practical 
and  concrete  ends.  The  "Young  German"  enthusiasm 
for  the__Revolution  of  1830  was  followed  by  the  political 
lyric^ which  enjoyed  a  great  vogue  in  Germany  from  1840 
to  tfie  Revolution  of  1848.  This  lyric,  like  all  political 
poetry,  had,  however,  only  a  very  transient  interest,  and 
it  seems  even  less  sincere  to  us  to-day  than  that  which 
was  inspired  by  the  War  of  Liberation  a  generation  earlier. 
In  its  beginnings  the  new  poetry  was  not  restricted  to  re- 
volutionary propaganda,  but  was  also  inspired  by  a  growing 
distrust  of  the  enemy  beyond  the  Rhine,  who  under  the 
"  Young  German  "  regime  had  enjoyed  a  high  degree  of 
favour.  The  movement  began  with  a  group  of  Rhine 
songs,  Per  deutsche  Rhein  by  Nikolaus  Becker  (1809-45), 
with  its  famous  refrain,  "  Sie  sollen  ihn  nicht  haben,  den 
freien  deutschen  Rhein " ;  the  still  more  famous  Wacht 
am  Rhein  by  Max  Schneckenburg  (1819-49),  and  a  Rhein- 
liedty  Robert  Prutz  (1816-72),  which  brings  out  clearly 
the  relation  of  the  political  movement  to  the  radicalism  of 
the  "  Young  German  "  era.  All  three  songs  date  from  the 
year  1840.  Of  the  three  poets  only  Prut/,  has  any  further 
claim  on  our  attention.  He  wrote  ballads  and  histori- 
cal tragedies,  as  well  as  political  poetry,  and  he  narrowly 
escaped  summary  punishment  for  a  satirical  comedy,  Die 
poiitische  Wochenstube  (1843).  In  later  life  Prutz  pro- 


250  THE    POLITICAL    LYRIC. 

duced  a  few  lyrics  that  have  been  remembered,  but, 
once  he  had  enlisted  his  talent  in  the  service  of  politics, 
it  was  difficult  for  him  to  regain  his  freedom  ;  and  this 
was  true  not  only  of  Prutz,  but  of  most  of  his  fellow- 
singers  as  well. 

The  revolutionary  lyric  broke  out  in  earnest  in  the 
following  year,  1841.  Towards  the  end  of  that  year 
Ferdinand  Freiligrath  in  a  poem,  Aus  Spanien,  made  an 
appeal  to  his  brother  poets  to  stand  " _auf  einer  hohereo 
Warte  als  auf  den  Zinnen  der  Partei."  This  called  forth 
a  passionate  retort  from  a  young  Swabian,  Georg  Herwegh, 
that  party  spirit  was  the  mother  of  all  enthusiasms  an.d^all 
victories  ;  why  should  the  poet  hold  himself  aloof  from  it  ? 
PY>r  the  first  time  the  unworldly  idealism  of  the  Romantic 
lyric  was  challenged,  and  before  long  the  young  revolution- 
aries of  1841  had  carried  with  them  some  of  the  last  out7 
posts  of  Romanticism,  and  even  Freiligrath  himself. 

Herwegh  and  Freiligrath  were  the  most  eminent  poets 
of  this  group.  The  former  of  these  was  born  in  Stuttgart 
in  1817,  and  passed  a  somewhat  stormy  youth,  which 
culminated  in  an  insult  to  an  officer,  as  a  consequence  of 
which  he  had  to  flee  to  Switzerland.  Here  he  published 
his  Gedichte  ernes  Lebendigen  in  1841,  a  second  collection 
following"  in  1844.  Hervvegh's  verse  recalls  in  its  youth- 
ful exuberance  the  lyric  of  1813,  but  it  also  falls  frequently 
into  the  bombastic  tone  that  disfigured  much  of  the 
latter.  He  has,  however,  written  not  a  few  verses  which 
justify  the  belief  that  he  might  have  produced  poetry 
of  a  higher  kind,  had  he  once  been  able  to  outgrow  his 
revolutionary  fever.  On  the  strength  of  his  Gedichte  eines 
Lebendigen  Herwegh  became  a  celebrity  ;  he  returned  to 
Germany,  and  was  granted  an  interview  by  the  Prussian 
king  in  which  the  latter  expressed  the  hope  that,  if  they 
must  be  enemies,  they  would  at  least  be  honourable  ones. 
But  this  it  was  not  in  Herwegh's  nature  to  be ;  he  took 
advantage  of  the  occasion  to  make  political  propaganda, 
and  when  the  authorities  intervened,  he  wrote  a  letter  to 
the  king  in  a  tone  which  led  to  his  immediate  expulsion. 
The  role  of  exiled  political  martyr  was  not,  however,  dis- 


HERWEGH    AND    FREILIGRATH.  251 

tasteful  to  Herwegh,  and  when  the  Revolution  of  1848 
broke  out,  he  placed  himself  at  ...the  head  of  a  band  of 
French  and  German  revolutionaries  who  invaded  Baden 
with  the  intention  of  converting  that  state  into  a  republic. 
This  was  the  end  of  Herwegh's  career  as  a  politician 
and  also  as  a  poet.  His  death  did  not  take  place 
until  1874. 

Ferdinand  Freiligrath  was  a  much  more  staid  and  pro- 
ductive writer  than  Herwegh.  He  was  born  at  Detmold 
irT  1810  and  died  at  Cannstadt  in  1876.  His  early 
poetry  was  permeated  by  Romanticism,  less,  however,  by 
the  old  German  Romanticism  than  by  that  blend  of 
Byron  and  Victor  Hugo  which  was  to  the  taste  of  the 
younger  generation  ;  the  brilliant  exotic  colouring  of  the 
East  had  a  special  attraction  for  his  imagination  in  these 
early  days.  But  soon  after  Herwegh  sounded  his  call 
to  arms,  Freiligrath  abandoned  Romanticism  as  mere 
trifling,  and  became  a  political  poet.  In  Ein  Glau- 
bensbekenntnis  (1844)  he  declared  himself  openly  a  friend 
of  revolution  and  reform,  with  the  consequences  that, 
to  escape  prosecution,  he  was  obliged  to  flee,  first  to 
Belgium  and  then  to  Switzerland,  ultimately  to  make  a 
more  or  less  permanent  home  for  himself  in  London.  In 
1846  appeared  another  volume  of  revolutionary  poetry 
under  the  provocative  title  Ca  ira;  and  in  1848  Die  Toten 
und  die  Lebendigen  brought  upon  his  head  a  trial  for  lesc- 
mq/este,  which,  however,  ended  in  his  acquittal.  Lastly, 
in  1849  and  1850,  he  published  his  Neuere  politische  und 
soziale  Gedichte,  which  mark,  on  the  whole,  the  high-water 
mark  of  the  revolutionary  lyric.  In  spite  of  these  ten 
years  of  immersion  in  political  strife,  Freiligrath  remained 
at  heart  a  staunch  friend  of  Romanticism,  and,  like  other 
poets  of  that  time,  he  returned  to  his  old  love  in  the  more 
peaceful  days  that  followed.  JPowerful  as  the  best  of  his 
political  poetry  is,  one  cannot  help  feeling  nowadays 
that  he  is  a  greater  poet  when  he  follows  in  the  footsteps 
of  the  classic  and  romantic  masters,  or  when  he  translates 
Byron,  Burns,  or  Hugo;  at  least  this  is  the  poetry  by 
which  he  now  lives. 


252  THE    POLITICAL    LYRIC. 

The  other  poets  of  this  group,  as  far  at  least  as  they 
wrote  political  poetry,  are  now  forgotten.  Franz  Dingel-^ 
stedt  (1814-81),  for  example,  was  the  author  of  provocative 
Lieder  eines  kosmopolitischen  Nachtwachters  (1842),  but  he 
was  only  too  glad  to  forget  this  youthful  indiscretion 
when,  in  later  years,  he  became  an  able  and  successful 
director j)f  j:he  Court  Theatre^in  Stuttgart,  then  in  Munich 
and  in  Weimar,  where  he  was  responsible  for  a  memorable 
cycle  of  Shakespeare's  histories  produced  on  the  occasion 
of  the  Shakespeare  Tercentenary  in  1864;  ultimately  he 
became  director  of  the  Vienna  Hofburgtheater.  In  this 
practical  activity  lay  his  strength,  not  in  his  lyric,  his 
dramas,  or  his  novels.  A.  H.  Hoffmann  von  Fallersjeben 
(1798-1874)  was  also  only  apolitical  poet  by  the  way. 
A  distinguished  German  philologist,  he  was  obliged  to 
resign  his  professorship  at  Breslau  as  a  consequence  of 
the  publication  in  1840  and  1841  of  two  volumes  of  Un- 
politische  Lieder.  From  1843  on  ne  lived  a  wandering, 
unsettled  life,  which  brought  him  into  touch  with  all 
classes  of  the  German  people.  His_lyrics,  without  break- 
ing fresh  ground  as,  for  instance,  Freiligrath's  so  often  do, 
approximate  more  closely  to  the  Volkslied ;  at  the  same 
time  his  purely  political  verses  are  rarely  so  arid  of  genuine 
lyric  feeling  as  most  of  the  political  lyric  of  the  time. 
Hoffmann's  poetry  may  not  soar  very  high,  but  it  is  always 
poetry  ;  and  songs  like  Deutschland,  Deutschland  iiber  alles 
have  still  a  warm  place  in  the  nation^TTeartT 

Austria  had,  as  we  have  seen,  been  more  mercilessly 
ground  under  the  heel  of  bureaucratic  tyranny  in  the 
earlier  half  of  the  nineteenth  century  than  North  Germany  ; 
it  is  consequently  not  surprising  that  here^  too,  the 
political  lyric  of  the  forties  should  have  found  an  echo. 
But  by  this  time  the  character  of  Austrian  political  poetry 
had  become  resigned,  and  the  Austrian  poets  who  did 
contribute  to  the  political  lyric,  such  as  Karl  Beck  (1817- 
79),  Moritz  Hartmann  (1821-72),  and  A.  Meissner  (1822- 
85),  leave  the  impression  that  the  revolutionary  ideas  no 
longer  stood  in  the  foreground  of  their  interests.  If  these 
men  are  remembered  at  all  to-day,  it  is  for  other  than 


MINOR    POETS    AND    CRITICS.  253 

political  reasons — Beck  for  his  sympathetic  pictures  of 
Hungarian  life,  Hartmann  as  the  able  editor  of  the  Neue 
Freie  Presse,  Meissner  as  an  exponent  of  the  Byronic 
spirit  in  Austrian  poetry.  Greater  than  any  of  these 
was  the  Tyolese  singer,  Hermann  von  Gilm  (1812-64), 
whose  strength  also  lay  rather  in  the  lyric  of  emotion  than 
in  his  championship  of  liberal  opinions  in  politics. 

Other  poets  who  came  more  or  less  under  the  influence 
of  the  revolutionary  movement  were  Gottfried  Kinkel 
(1815-82),  a  victim  of  the  rising  of  1848,  who  was  rescued 
from  prison  in  1850  by  the  subsequent  German-American 
leader,  Karl  Schurz;  Emanuel  Geibel  (1815-84),  to  whom 
we  shall  return  later,  his  connection  with  the  political 
lyric  being  comparatively  brief;  and  Moritz  von  Strach- 
witz  (1822-47).  Of  these,  Kinkel  enjoyed  great  popu- 
larity in  his  day;  but  both  his  Gedichte  (1843)  and  his 
poetic  romance  Otto  der  Schiitz  (1846)  seem  to  us  now 
sentimental  and  superficial.  Strachwitz,  on  the  other 
hand,  a  young  Silesian  nobleman  who  was  cut  off  at  the 
age  of  twenty-five,  was  the  most  promising  of  them  all. 
His  Lieder  eines  Envachenden  (1842)  are  poems  of  extra- 
ordinary promise  and  show  that  he  had  learned  his  art 
from  the  best  of  masters,  August  von  Platen. 

Through  all  this  age  the  ideals  of  "  Young  Germany  " 
prevailed  in  German  history  and  literary  criticism.  Wolf- 
gang Menzel  (1798-1873)  gave  voice  in  trenchant  form 
to  the  popular  predilections  and  antipathies  ;  while  G.  G. 
Gervinus  (1805-71)  wrote  in  a  more  measured  style,  tem- 
pered by  the  philosophy  of  Hegel,  the  history  of  German 
literature  ( Geschichte  der  deutschen  Nationalliteratur,  1835. 
Meanwhile,  in  Berlin,  K.  A.  Varnhagen  von  Ense  (i785- 
1858)  fought  almost  single-handed  to  overcome  the  in- 
difference of  the  younger  generation  to  Goethe  and  the 
great  Romantic  poetry. 


254 


CHAPTER    XXIII. 

MIDCENTURY    FICTION. 

AFTER  the  storms  of  the  revolutionary  epoch,  which,  as 
we  have  just  seen,  were  reflected  in  the  political  lyric  of 
the  time,  German  literature  entered  uponji  calmer  and 
more  even  period  of  its  history.  The  third  quarter  of 
the  century  was  not  deficient  in  germinative  ideas  and 
important  works,  but  it  was,  as  far  as  literature  was  con- 
cerned, a  period  of  intellectual  indifference;  the  movement 
of  the  time  was  not  favourable  to  poetry.  The  philosophy 
of  (i.  \V.  T7.  Hegel  (1770-1831)  had  dominated  the  era  of 
Romantic  decay,  and  especially  that  which  followed  the 
Revolution  of  1830.  Hegel's  first  notable  work,  Die 
Phdnomenologie  des  Geistes,  appeared  in  1807  ;  his  Logik 
between  1812  and  1816,  and  his  Philosophic  des  Rechts 
in  1820.  Hegel  set  out  from  a  Romantic  basis,  but  his 
collectivism  and  his  extraordinarily  synthetic  mind  were 
Jiosiilfi_Jo.___that  unfettered  individualism  which  was  the 
life-blood  of  Romanticism.  It  is  strange  that  this  great 
thinker,  who  opened  up  to  the  nineteenth  century  a  new 
world  of  thought,  should  have  exerted  so  barren,  and  even 
blighting,  an  influence  on  literature.  As  time  went  on, 
his  philosophy  gave  place-  to  the  more  radical,  if  less 
constructive,  thinking  of  the  so-called  "Young  Hegel- 
ians," like  Ludwig  Feuerbach  (1804-72),  author  of  Das 
Wesen  des  Christentums  (1841),  and  David  Friedrich 
Strauss,  (1818-74),  whose  Das  Leben  Jesu  made  so  great 
a  stir  in  the  world  in  1835  ;  and  this  in  turn  was  ousted 
by  the  pessimism  of  Arthur  Schopenhauer  (1788-1860). 


HEGEL    AND    SCHOPENHAUER.  255 

Schopenhauer's  chief  work,  Die  Welt  als  Wille  und 
Vorstellung,  appeared  as  early  as  1819,  but  only  became 
a  force  of  magnitude  in  German  intellectual  life  after 
the  middle  of  the  century.  His  philosophy,  negative 
as  it  was,  afforded  the  basis  for  a  revival  of  poetry,  on 
something  akin  to  the  earlier  Romantic  basis,  in  the  sixties 
and  seventies.  Schopenhauer  has  another  and  more 
special  claim  to  a  p. ace  in  the  history  of  literature  by 
virtue  of  his  style,  which  is  to  be  seen  at  its  best  in  the 
essays  of  the  collection,  Parerga  und  Paralipomena  (1851); 
he  is  one  of  the  most  eminent  German  prose  writers  of 
the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century.  The  supremacy 
of  literature  in  these  decades  was  threatened"  From  another 
side,  namely,  by  the  rise  of  an  absorbing  interest  in 
science,  which,  thanks  to  new  discoveries,  new  theories  of 
matter  and  force,  and,  above  all,  of  biological  evolution, 
was  making  an  appeal  to  the  popular  imagination,  as  it 
had  never  made  before.  It  is  consequently  hardly  sur- 
prising that,  amidst  so  many  conflicting  interests,  poetry 
should  have  been  relegated  to  a  subordinate  place ;  it 
also  explains  why  the  literature  which  attracted  chief 
attention  in  these  years,  was  a  "  Tendenzliteratur,"  a 
literature  with  a  purpose. 

As  in  the  classical  period  the  drama,  in  the  Romantic 
the  lyric,  so  now,  when  classicism  and  Romanticism  had 
alike  receded  into  the  past,  it  was  the  novel  which 
held  the  first  place  in  popular  favour.  The  stamp  of 
this  age  is  to  be  sought  in  its  fiction.  The  midcentury 
novel  may  be  said  to  have  arisen  directly  out  of  the 
_social  and  political  tendencies  of  the  time  ;  but  it  was 
also  deeply  influenced  by  contemporary  masters  in  French 
and  English  literature,  such  as  Balzac  and  Dickens. 
Rarely,  as  in  the  case  of  Keller's  Der  griine  Heinrich  or 
Storm's  "  Novellen,"  do  we  find  books  which  are  predom- 
inantly inspired  by  the  traditions  of  Romanticism  ;  even 
the  historical  novel  preferred,  to  its  disadvantage,  to 
follow  the  methods  laid  down  by  an  exacting  science 
of  history  rather  than  to  go  back  to  the  more  spacious 
imaginative  art  of  Scott  and  his  earlier  German  imitators. 


256  MIDCENTURY    FICTION. 

The  interestinJhe_L'JV.olk,"  which  the  later  Romanticists 
had  cultivated  and  of  which  the  "  Young  German  "  realists 
had  at  least  not  disapproved,  now  brought  in  a  rich  harvest. 
Immermantrs  Oberhof  was  the  starting-point ;  and  the  first 
important  representative  of  the  peasant-novel  was  Albert 
IJitzius,  better  known  by  his  literary  pseudonym  of 
"Jeremias  Gotthelf"  (1797  1854).  This  Swjss_paslar.'s 
stories,  of  which  the  best  are  Wie  Uli  der  Knecht 
gliicklich  ward  (1841),  Uli  der  Pdchter  (1846),  and 
Elsi,  die  selfsame  Magd  (1850),  are  not  free  from  a 
moralising  purpose,  which  recalls  the  social  novels  of  the 
eighteenth  century  ;  but  so  whole-hearted  and  sincere  is  his 
realism  that,  if  we  have  to  seek  an  old-world  analogy  for 
his  art,  we  look  rather  to  the  bucolic,  Homeric  simplicity 
of  Voss.  Less  true  to  nature  are  the  famous  Schwarzwal- 
der__Dprfgeschichten  (1843-57)  by  Berthold  Auerbach__ 
(1812-82);  for  Auerbach  was  less  able  to  sustain  the 
tone  of  'naivete,  less  able  to  keep  himself  free  from  the 
literary  and  social  tendencies  of  his  time  ;  the  Schwarzwal- 
der  Dorfgeschichten  were  the  products  of  a  very  definite 
epoch,  the  ideas  of  which  were  soon  to  pass  away. 
None  the  less,  these  stories  were,  in  their  time,  a  welcome 
relief  from  the  novels  with  a  purpose  of  the  "  Young 
German  "  school,  and  they  were  the  forerunners  of  a  liter- 
ature of  the  peasant  that  has  steadily  increased  down  to 
our  own  time.  Auerbach's  longer  novels,  such  as  Auf  der 
Hohe  (1865),  Das  Landhaus  am  Rhein  (1869),  and  Wald- 
fried  (1874)  were  less  successful;  for  here  his  philosophic 
and  sociological  ideas,  which  show  how  closely  he  was 
bound  up  with  the  "  Young  German  "  period,  had  freer 
play ;  moreover,  he  was  deficient  in  constructive  talent. 

The  note  of  artistic  sincerity  which  is  lacking  in  Auer- 
bach and  his  imitators  is  to  be  found  in  the  idylls  and 
stories  (Studien,  1844-50)  of  Adalbert  Stifter  (1805-68), 
the  prose  poet  of  the  Bohemian  Forest,  and  in  the  works 
of  the  North  German  novelist,  Fritz  Reuter  (1810-74), 
who,  _of  all  the  writers  of  this  time,  is  most  akin  in  his 
art  and  methods  to  Dickens.  But  Reuter  is  more  of 
a  realist  than  Dickens,  and  the  scope  of  his  art  more 


REUTER   AND    FREYTAG.  257 

limited.  _He__re&tricts  himself  in  his  best  work  to  his  own 
province  of  Mecklenburg,  and  writes  in  Mecklenburg 
"jPlattdeutsch,"  but  he  gives  us  a  picture  of  the  life  of  that 
province  in  its  totality.  Like  Dickens,  lie  occasionally 
yields  to  the  temptations  of  sentimental  writing,  but  he 
never  caricatures.  In  his  three  greatest  novels,  Ut  de 
Franzosentid  (1860),  Ut  mine  Festungstid  (1863),  and 
Ut  mine  Stromtid  (1862-64),  he  has  drawn  largely  on  the 
experiences  of  his  own  unhappy  life,  which,  on  a  mere 
suspicion  of  political  disaffection,  the  Prussian  government 
ruined  by  seven  years'  imprisonment  in  a  fortress.  Only 
in  the  Stromtid,  the  story  of  his  later  life  as  "  Strom  "  or 
agriculturist  in  Mecklenburg,  do  we  find  a  more  restful 
outlook  upon  life.  With  these  books  Reuter  achieved 
what  the  satirists  of  the  seventeenth  century  attempted 
without  success ;  _he_  made  "  Plattdeutsch "  a  literary 
language ;  and  it  is  largely  due  to  him  that  this  alone 
or  the  German  dialects  has  effectively  resisted  the  levelling 
influence  of  literary  High  German.  What  Reuter  did  for 
"Plattdeutsch"  prose,  Klaus  Groth  (1819-99),  trie  author 
of  Quickborn.  (1852).  a  collection  of  simple  lyrics  written 
in  the  Ditmarsch  dialect,  did  for  the  language  as  a  vehicle 
of  lyric  expression. 

The  novel  of  ideas  at  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth 
century  was  pre-eminently  the  social  novel ;  the  tentative 
and  experimental  beginnings  of  Laube  and  Gutzkow  are 
here  developed.  The  master  of  this  form  of  fiction 
was  Gustav  Freytag  (1816-95),  a  native  of  Upper  Silesia. 
He  made  his  reputation  first,  however,  as  a  dramatist. 
After  attaining  a  certain  ephemeral  success  with  plays 
such  as  Die  Valentine  (1847)  and  Graf  Waldemar  (1848), 
he  produced  in  Die  Journalisten  (1852)  what  may  be  re- 
garded as  the  besT  comedy  of  modern  life  of  its  time,  a 
play  whictThas  still  a  place  on  the  repertory  of  most 
German  theatres.  But  excellent  as  Die  Journalisten  is— 
and  its  strength  lies  rather  in  its  brilliant  and  witty 
dialogue  than  in  any  merit  or  novelty  of  form  or  theme- 
it  rather  brings  to  a  greater  perfection  the  comedy  of  the 
previous  generation  than  inaugurates  a  new  stage  in  the 

R 


258  MIDCENTURY    FICTION. 

development  of  the  German  drama.  In  Die  Journalist  en, 
in  other  words,  Freytag  nationalised  the  French  corned^ 
of  the  era  of  Scribe.  In  1855  appeared  his  Soil  und 
JTahcn,  the  best  novel  of  its  epoch.  This  is  a  story  on 
fthe  model  of  the  English  novel,  dealing  with  modern 
German  commercial  life.  In  seeking  the  German  people, 
"where  it  is  to  "be  found  most  efficient,  at  its  work," 
Freytag  put  the  literary  stamp  on  the  new  democratic 
ideals  which  had  come  into  power  with  the  Revolution 
of  1848.  His  broad  outlook  on  the  rising  German  de- 
mocracy, his  constant  assertion  of  the  worth  and  dignity 
of  commercialism  beside  the  prestige  of  noble  birth,  and 
the  kindly  optimism  with  which  he  brings  the  hero  of  this 
story  of  industry  and  application  to  the  headship  of  a  great 
Hamburg  commercial  house,  make  Freytag's  Soil  und 
Haben  one  of  the  representative  books  of  its  time.  His 
next  novel,  Die  verlorene  Handschrift  (1864),  was  an  at- 
tempt to  do  for  the  German  professor  what  he  had  already 
done  for  the  German  merchant.  But  the  kind  of  con- 
flict which  Freytag  introduced  here — on  the  quest  of  a 
lost  manuscript  of  Tacitus  the  professor  neglects  his 
young  wife  and  exposes  her  to  the  wiles  of  a  princely 
lover — lay  somewhat  outside  Freytag's  sphere,  and  de- 
manded a  finer  poetic  insight  than  he  had  at  his  com- 
mand. The  consequence  is  that  the  novel  degenerates 
often  into  triviality,  and  the  possibilities  of  the  theme 
are  not  fully  taken  advantage  of. 

In  later  life  Freytag  devoted  himself  to  historical  studies. 
Under  masters  like  Leopold  von  Ranke  (1795-1886)  and 
his  disciples,  G.  Waitz  (1813-86),  W.  Giesebrecht  (1814- 
89),  and  Heinrich  von  Sybel  (1817-95) — to  whose  work 
must  be  added  the  magnificent  basis  for  the  study  of  the 
national  past  provided  by  the  Monument  a  Germanics 
historica,  which  Stein  had  founded  in  1819 — history  was 
becoming  an  element  of  growing  importance  in  German 
culture.  But  the  historians  did  not  limit  themselves  to 
\  "German  history;  as  early  as  1854-56  Theodor  Mommsen 
(1817-1904)  had  given  the  world  that  Romische  Geschichte 
which  laid  an  indispensable  basis  for  the  study  of  ancient 

?xf 

I  * 


FREYTAG'S  HISTORICAL  NOVELS.  259 

Rome;  and  in  1860  Jakob  Burckhardt  (1818-97)  in- 
vestigated the  spiritual  forces  of  the  Renaissance  in  his 
fundamental  Die  Kultur  der  Renaissance  in  Italien. 
Between  i859"and  1862  .b'reytag  published  his  Bilder  aus  - 

der  deutschen  Vergangenheit,  a  series  of  vivid  pictures  of 
the  great  epochs  of  German  history  ;  and  on  the  basis  of 
these  studies  he  planned  a  great  prose  epic,  J)ic  Ahncn, 
in  the  form  of  a  succession  of  historical  romances  illus- 
trating German  national  life  from  the  fourth  to  the  middle 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  The  series  opened  well  in  1872 
with  Ingo  and  Ingraban,  which  were  followed  by  Das  Nest 
der  Zaunkonige  (eleventh  century,  1874),  Die  Briider  vom 
deutschen  Haus  (thirteenth  century,  1875),  Marcus  Kdnig 
(sixteenth  century,  1876),  and  gradually  tapered  away  in 
Die  Geschivister,  two  stories  of  the  seventeenth  and  early 
eighteenth  centuries  (1878),  and  Aus  einer  kleinen  Stadt 
(1880),  which  culminates  with  the  Revolution  of  1848. 
Freytag  did  not  complete  his  task  with  the  same  freshness 
and  zeal  with  which  he  had  begun  it ;  and  indeed  none  of 
the  novels  touches  the  heights  of  Soil  und  Haben  or  Die 
verlorene  Handschrift.  What  was  more  unfortunate  for  the 
German  historical  novel  is  that  in  these  books  he  opened 
the  door  to  an  inartistic :  ,c[idacticism,,..a  desire  to  be  his- 
torically instructive,  which  has  proved  fatal  to  this  form 
of  fiction  in  modern  Germany. 

The  development  of  the  historical  novel  on  antiquarian 
lines  is  to  be  seen  especially  in  the  work  of  Georg  Ebers 
and  Felix  Dahn.  .Ebers  (1857-98)  was  professor  of 
Egyptology  in  Leipzig,  and  made  his  reputation  by  a 
bold  and  novel  attempt  to  embody  the  results  of  his 
science  in  a  romance  of  ancient  Egypt,  Eine_Jigy£tisc/ie_ 
Konigstochter  (1864).  This  book  was  followed  by  a  long 
series  of  historical  novels  on  similar  lines,  ranging  in  their 
subjects  from  biblical  times  and  antiquity  to  the  Reforma- 
tion. Ebers's  strength  lay  in  his  faculty  of  reproducing 
and  synthesising  the  conditions  of  a  remote  historical 
_gast;  but  apart  from  this,  his  books  are  common- 
place, sentimental  stories,  of  no  distinctive  literary  worth. 
The  same  criticism  applies  generally  to  the  historical 


260  MIDCEN'TURY    FICTION. 

fiction  of  Felix  Dahn  (born  1834),  whose  scholarly 
investigations  into  the  early  history  of  the  Germanic 
peoples  (Die  Konigeder  Germanen,  1861-72)  are  of  real 
importance!  Even  Darin's  most  popular  novel,  Ein 
Kampf  um  Rom  (1876),  a  story  of  the  Gothic  invasion 
of  the  Roman  "empire,  becomes,  when  stripped  of  its 
historical  deckings,  merely  a  not  very  original  novel  of 
sensational  happenings.  The  German  movement  is  anal- 
ogous to  that  represented  in  England  by  the  historical 
rfovels  of  Bulwer  Lytton,  whose  rehabilitations  of  past 
ages  show,  it  may  be,  less  knowledge  and  conscientious 
study,  but  more  literary  power. 

But  all  these  writers  pale  before  Gottfried  Keller 
(1819-90),  the  greatest  German  novelist  of  the  middle 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  Keller  was  born  at  Zurich 
on  July  1  8,  1819,  and  grew  up  in  the  conviction  that 
his  natural  bent  lay  in  painting.  He  spent  two  years 
in  Munich  studying  painting,  then  gave  it  up  for 
literature.  Between  1850  and  1855  lie  was  in  Berlin, 
where  he  wrote  his  first  romance,  Der  grilne  Heinrich 
(1854-55).  ^Der  griine^Hdnrich  js^the  last  of_the  great  _ 
Romantic  novels  that  trace  their  lineage  back  in  the 
direct  line  to  Wilhelm  Meister^  Like  its  model,  it  is 
the  history  of  a  young  man's  apprenticeship  to  life,  the 
record  of  a  would-be  artist's  struggles,  temptations,  and 
dreams  up  to  the  point  where  he  grows  courageous 
enough  to  face  the  truth  that  he  has  chosen  the  wrong 
vocation.  The  book  has  little  form  and  little  story  to 
tell,  but  no  novel  of  the  nineteenth  century  is  richer 
in  poetic  beauties  than  this  uneventful  story  into  which 
Keller,  with  Romantic  subjectivity,  has  woven  much  both 
of  the  "  Dicfrtump'  and  the  "Wahrheit"  of  his  own  life. 
Keller's  powers  are,  however,  seen  to  even  better  ad- 
vantage TrTThe^'^NoveTTe""  or_short  story.  In  1856  and 
In  1874  appeared  two  volumes  entitled  Die  Leute  -von 
^j.  in  1872,  Sieben  Le^enden  ;  in  '1878,  Zit  'richer 


Novellen,  and  1882,  Das  Sinngedicht^  The  stories  which 
"make  Up  these  collections  are  of  unequal  value,  but  the 
best  of  them,  such  as  Romeo  und  Julia  auj  dem  Dorfe, 


KELLER    AND    STORM.  26l 

Das  Fdhnlein  der  sieben  Aufrechten,  Der  Landvogt  von 
Greifensee,  are  unsurpassed  in  the  literature  of  the  century. 
As  in  his  long  novel,  a  certain  formlessness,  combined 
with  a  blunt,  unsentimental  style,  has  stood  in  the  way  of 
the  widest  popularity;  but  his  vision  is  extraordinarily 
true,  and  his  imagination  reveals  powers  of  Romantic 
insight  in  which  he  was  not  approached  by  any  other 
German  writer  of  his  time.  In  1861  Keller  was  ap- 
pointed "erster  Staatsschreiber  "  of  the  canton  of  Ziirich, 
a  position  which  he  occupied  for  fifteen  years ;  he  retired 
in  1876  and  died  in  1890.  He  has  left  one  other  long 
novel,  Martin  Salander,  published  in  1886,  which  shows, 
however,  some  falling-off  in  his  powers.  As  a  lyric  poet 
(Gedickte,  1846;  Neuere  Gedichtc,  1851),  his  originality 
is  no  less  marked  than  in  his  prose  works,  and  he 
deservedly  takes  a  high  place  in  an  age  which,  as  far 
as  lyric  poetry  was  concerned,  was  content  to  move  in 
traditional  grooves. 

Theodor  Storm  (1817-88),  the  North  German  master 
of  the  mid-century  "  Novelle,"  forms  another  link  between 
the  old  Romanticism  and  the  modern  spirit.  But  Storm 
stood  more  under  the  shadow  of  the  Romantic  traditions 
than  his  Swiss  contemporary.  His  Gedichte  (1853)  are, 
for  the  most  part,  influenced  by  Eichendorff ;  and  all  his 
writings^  whether  prose  or  verse,  are  filled  with' a  Romantic 
love  for  the  moors  and  coasts  of  his  Schleswig-Holstein 
home.  His  "  Novellen  "  fall  into  two  groups;  the  older 
ones,  such  as  Immensee  (1852),  Im  Sonnenschein  (1854), 
Ein  griines  Blatt  (1855),  are  pessimistic  in  tone,  and 
delight  in  jetrospect  and__._r.esignatioj} ;  while  a  second 
group  includes  the  more  realistic,  psychological,  and  even 
dramatic  stories^which  he  cultivated  from  1877  on.  The 
best  examples  of  this  second  group  are  Psyche  (1877), 
Aquis  Submersus  (1877),  Renate  (1878) — the  two  latter 
belonging  to  a  series  of  realistically  archaic  "  Chronik- 
novellen."  Storm's  last  two  stories,  John  Rieiv1  (1886) 
and  Der  Schimmelreiter  (1888),  bear  witness  to  his  desire 
to  keep  abreast  of  the  modern  movement  in  fiction 
towards  psychological  realism^ 


262  MIDCENTURY    FICTION. 

The  third  of  the  leading  German  short-story  writers 
of  this  period  is  Paul  .Heyse  (born  1830),  whose  first 
volume  of  Novellen  appeared  as  early  as  1855.  This  was 
followed  by  an  almost  endless  series  of  short  stories — 
Meraner  Novellen  (1864),  Moralische  Novellen  (1869  and 
1878),  Troubadour- Novellen  (1882),  etc. — which  show  a 
marvellously  fertile  imagination  and  invention.  Heyse 
is  superior  both  to  Keller  and  Storm  in  the  matter  of 
form.  A  passionate  lover  of  Italy,  he  began  his  life  as 
a  student  of  the  Romance  literatures  and  learned  from 
them  a  lesson  in  style  which  he  has  never  forgotten. 
He  fashions  his  stories  with  the  eye  of  the  sculptor  or 
the  painter ;  _beauty_  of  form  and  expression  is  the  constant 
end  he  has  in  view,  however  much  he  may  be  tempted 
by  problems  of  piquant  psychological  interest  to  wander 
into  irrelevant  byways.  And  yet,  although  Heyse  has 
outlived  both  Keller  and  Storm,  his  work  has  been 
less  able  to  stand  the  test  of  time  than  theirs.  His 
style  seems  nowadays  too  scintillating  and  clever  to  be 
sincere,  and  the  types  of  character  and  incident  which 
attract  him,  belong  rather  to  the  "Young  German  "  era 
than  to  our  modern  time.  The  best  of  his  "  Novellen  " 
still  remain  the  early  Italian  ones,  where  his  objectivity 
is  most  complete  and  his  vision  least  warped  by  per- 
sonal prejudices. 

Heyse  has  also  written  several  long  novels,  of  which 
o n e^jaL. leasi,. ^Kinder  der  Welt .,.(1873),  is  of  the  first 
Importance.  Kinder  tier  }\\'lt  is  a  "Zeitroman"  and 
the  representative  novel  of  its  time  :  its  main  theme  is 
the  antagonism  between  the  "children  of  the  world" 
and  the  "children  of  God,"  which  was  a  very  real  one 
to  the  generation  which  came  through  the  midcentury 
conflict  between  ^orthodoxy  and  science ;  but  the  new 
forces  of  pessimism,  of  social  democracy,  and  imperialism 
also  play  a  large  part  in  the  book.  A  second  novel,  Im 
Paradiese  (1876),  deals  more  exclusively  with  Munich 
artist-circles,  and  did  not  make  so  wide  an  appeal ;  while 
Heyse's  more  recent  novels  are,  with  the  exception  of 
Der  Roman  der  Stiftsdame  (1886),  mainly  occupied  with 


HEYSE    AND    SPIELHAGEN.  263 

attacks  on  modern  literary  movements  with  which  Heyse 
is  not  in  sympathy.  As  a  dramatist,  Heyse  has  failed  to 
win  a  permanent  place  for  himself  in  the  repertory  of  the 
German  theatre,  but  some  of  his  plays,  especially  Hans 
Lange  (1866)  and  Colberg  (1868),  are  classic  in  their 
well-balanced  form  and  polished  style. 

Gutzkow's  most  immediate  successor  was  Friedrich 
Spielhagen  (1829-1911),  a  much  more  militant  repre- 
sentative of  the  social  novel  than  I'Yeytag.  His  Prol>- 
lemattscht  Naturen  (1860)  deals,  like  Gutzkow's  'Ritter 
vom  (jeiste,  with  the  period  of  the  Revolution  of  1848, 
but  in  a  more  modern  way  ;  it  is  to  that  epoch  what  .Kinder 
der  Welt  is  to  the  later  sixties.  Spielhagen  here  holds 
the  mirror  up  to  the  generation  that  had  come  through 
the  fever  and  the  fret  of  1848,  and  voices  its  hopes 
and  aspirations  and  despairs.  The  phrase  "  problematic 
natures  "  was  originally  Goethe's,  and  is  applied  to  those 
vacillating,  indecisive  people  who  are  unequal  to  any  situa- 
tion in  which  they  happened  to  be  placed,  and  unable  to 
obtain  either  satisfaction  or  happiness  from  life.  Spiel- 
hagen's  hero,  Oswald  Stein,  who  dies  fighting  in  the  Rev- 
olution of  1848,  is  such  a  nature,  a  dreamer  of  dreams, 
for  whom  the  enigma  of  life  remains  to  the  end  unsolved. 
Problematische  Naturen  was  followed  by  In  Reitt  und 
Glied  (1866)  and  Hammer  und  Amboss  (1869),  excel- 
lent novels,  in  which  the  socialistic  and  economic 
ideas  of  the  time  form  the  background.  Spielhagen  was 
an  exceedingly  voluminous  writer,  but  his  development 
as  a  literary  artist  did  not  keep  pace  with  his  ideas, 
which  remained  to  the  last  in  sympathy  with  all  that 
was  liberal  and  advanced  in  German  thought.  Of  his 
later  books,  hardly  more  than  one,  namely,  Sturmflut 
(1876),  which  deals  with  the  financial  crises  in  Berlin 
after  the  Franco-German  War,  can  stand  comparison 
with  his  earlier  masterpieces. 

These  are  the  leading  novelists  of  this  period.  Of 
the  many  minor  writers  of  fiction  mention  may  be  made 
of  two  German-American  writers,  Charles  Sealsfield,  whose 
real  name  was  K.  A.  Postl  (1793-1864),  and  Friedrich 


264  MIDCENTURY    FICTION. 

Gerstacker  (1816-72),  both  of  whom  have  left  vivid  if 
somewhat  highly  coloured  sketches  and  novels  of  American 
life.  The  works  of  the  Grafin  Ida  Hahn-Hahn  (1805-80), 
again,  are  surrounded  by  an  atmosphere  of  catholic  ascet- 
icism, and  describe  aspects  of  the  social  life  of  their  time 
which  lay  outside  the  range  of  the  "Young  Germans"  and 
their  immediate  successors. 


CHAPTER    XXIV. 

NEW  BEGINNINGS  IN  THE  DRAMA  ;    THE   MUNICH    SCHOOL. 

ALTHOUGH  the  novel  occupied  the  chief  place  as  a 
vehicle  for  the  social  and  intellectual  ideas  of  the  middle 
of  the  century,  the  drama  was  at  the  same  time  passing 
through  an  interesting  phase  of  its  development,  a  phase 
which  was  to  be  of  great  significance  for  the  later  time. 
The  representative  dramatists  of  this  period  were  Christian 
Friedrich  Fiebbel,  Otto  Ludwig,  and  Richard  JA'a^np-r. 
All  three  were  born  in  the  year  1813;  Hebbel  died  in 
1863,  and  Ludwig  in  1865,  just  as  Wagner  was  entering 
his  period  of  maturity. 

Hebbel  is  one  of  the  most  original  dramatic  writers  of 
the  nineteenth  century.  A  native  of  Holstein,  where  his 
childhood  was  spent  amidst  the  direst  poverty,  he  made  a 
beginning  to  his  literary  life  in  Hamburg  ;  in  spite  of  his 
poverty  he  studied  for  two  years  at  the  universities  oi 
Heidelberg  and  Munich,  and  when  fame  began  to  come 
to  him,  he  was  able,  with  the  help  of  a  pension  from  the 
King  of  Denmark,  to  spend  some  time  in  Italy.  On  his 
return  in  1845  he  settled  in  Vienna,  where,  after  his 
marriage  with  Christine  Enghaus,  a  leading  actress  of 
the  Hofburgtheater,  his  life  passed  into  quieter  waters. 
Hebbel  made  his  debut  under  "  Young  German  "  auspices 
in  1840  w\t\\  Jiidith.  This  is  a  powerful  tragedy  in  prose, 
on  which  the~struggles  of  Hebbel's  own  early  life  have 
left  their  traces,  but  it  is  mainly  significant  as  a  plea  for  the 
rights  of  personality,  of  which  Hebbel  makes  his  heroine 
THeTspokesman.  From  amidst  the  unrestrained  and  often 


266  NEW    BEGINNINGS    IN    THE    DRAMA. 

crude  brutality  of  this  tragedy,  the  figure  of  Judith  stands  out 
as  a  type  of  dramatic  heroine  that  was  new  to  the  dramatic 
literature  of  Europe.  In  Genoveva  (1843),  Hebbel's 
second  play,  he  went  back  to  a  theme  of  which  the 
Romantic  poets  were  fond,  but  he  treated  it  in  a  quite 
unromantic  and  modern  way  ;  in  his  hands  it  becomes 
a  psychological  study  of  an  uncontrollable  passion  against 
a"  picturesque  mediaeval  background.  Maria  Magdalene^ 
(1844)  is  a  "  biirgerliche  Tragodie,"  an  excellently  con- 
structed play  of  the  type  that  had  come  down  from 
Lessing  and  Schiller ;  but  with  his  love  for  the  bizarre 
in  human  relations,  and  his  tendency_to_accentuate  the 
psychological  problem,  Hebbel  has  invested  his  simple 
townsfolk  with  thoughts  and  emotions  which  often  seem 
too  complex  for  their  station  in  life. 

The  series  of  Hebbel's  greater  dramas  began  with 
Herodes  und  Mariamne  in  1850.  The  Jewish  story,  which 
in  its  original  form  presents  a  complicated  enough  psycho- 
logical problem,  is  treated  with  boldness  and  originality. 
In  Hebbel's  eyes  Herodes  loves  Mariamne  with  a 
superhuman  passion  that  stretches  out  its  arms  even 
beyond  the  grave  ;  the  play  becomes  a  tragedy  of  marriage, 
in  which  love  alone  is  unable  to  make  up  for  that  infringe- 
ment of  the  rights  of  the  woman's  individuality  of  which 
Herodes  is  guilty  in  his  treatment  of  Mariamne.  Here 
Hebbel  is  clearly  the  predecessor  of  the  drama  of  the 
later  nineteenth  century,  and  particularly  of  that  of 
Ibsen.  The  same  or  a  similar  ethic  theme  is  presented 
in  historic  guise  in  the  tragedy  of  Agnes  Bernauer  (1852), 
in  which  the  rights  of  the  individual  are  brought  into 
conflict  with  the  claims  of  the  state ;  cold  political 
reasoning  demands  the  sacrifice  of  Agnes,  a  sacrifice 
which,  like  that  of  Schiller's  Maria  Stuart,  is  doleful  rather 
than  tragic.  In  Gyges  und  sein  Ring  (1856),  the  fable  of 
which  comes  from  Herodotus,  Hebbel  found  a  subject 
peculiarly  adapted  to  his  strange  talent.  In  the  centre  of 
the  action  again  stands  a  woman,  who  resents  the  slight 
on  her  personality  inflicted  on  her  by  her  own  husband, 
and  wipes  out  the  disgrace  by  murder  and  suicide.  Of 


FRIEDRICH    HEBBEL.  267 

all  Hebbel's  tragedies  this  seems  the  one  in  which  the 
conflict  has  most  vraisemblance  and  is  least  at  variance 
with  normal  human  experience ;  it  is  also,  as  poetry,  the 
most  uniformly  sustained. 

Hebbel's  last  and  most  ambitious  work,  Die  Nibelungen 
(1862),  is  a  trilogy  on  which  he  spent  seven"  years.  "The 
immediate  stimulus  was  a  mediocre  tragedy  by  Raupach, 
Der  Nibelungenhort,  in  which  his  wife  had  made  an 
unforgettable  impression  upon  him  as  Kriemhild ;  but 
to  interpret  in  terms  of  his  own  delicate  psychological  art 
the  rough  mediaeval  simplicity  of  the  German  national  epic 
had,  no  doubt,  a  fascination  for  Hebbel's  genius.  He 
regarded  the  Nibelungenlied  as  a  picture  in  outline,  in 
which  he  had  to  fill  in  the  psychological  details.  He 
put,  moreover,  his  powers  to  a  peculiarly  severe  test  by 
accepting  the  epic  virtually  as  he  found  it ;  he  altered 
little  or  nothing,  unless  in  so  far  as  it  was  necessary  for 
dramatic  purposes  to  concentrate  the  action ;  such 
additions  ^.s  he  made  —  for  instance,  the  ethic  conflict 
between  the  new  Christianity  and  the  old  heathendom, 
which  forms  the  background — were  only  by  way  of  inter- 
pretation. He  retained  as  far  as  he  could  the  simplicity 
of  the  characters,  and  in  Hagen  and  in  the  Kriemhild  of 
the  closing  drama,  Kriemhilds  Rache,  he  has  created  con- 
vincing dramatic  figures  of  tragic  dignity  and  grandeur; 
but,  on  the  whole,  the  limitations  which  the  poet  set 
himself  were  detrimental  to  the  full  development  of  his 
peculiar  talent.  The  trilogy  is  neither  genuinely  mediaeval 
nor  genuinely  modern.  At  his  death  Hebbel  left,  like 
Schiller,  a  tragedy  on  the  subject  of  Demetrius  (1864); 
he  is  also  the  author  of  several  comedies,  Der  Diamant 
(1847),  Der  Rubin  (iSs'i^'W^M  Angela  (1855),  but 
these  are  of  subordinate  interest.  Among  his  non- 
dramatic  writings  his  Gedichts  (1842,  1848,  1857)  are 
remarkable  for  their  strength  and  originality,  although 
lacking  in  the  suaver  qualities  of  the  German  lyric ;  his 
epic  idyll,  Mutter  und  Kind  (1859),  is  a  contribution 
to  the  form  of  literature  on  which  Goethe  had  set  his 
stamp  in  Hermann  und  Dorothea;  and  his  Tagebiicher, 


268  NEW    BEGINNINGS    IN    THE    DRAMA. 

which  occupy  four  volumes  of  his  works,  afford  a  glimpse 
into  the  workshop  of  a  poet  to  which  it  would  be  difficult 
to  find  a  parallel  in  any  other  modern  literature. 

Hebbel's  contemporary,  Otto  Ludwig  (1813-65),  was  a 
very  different  type  of  man.  By  birth  a  Thuringian,  he 
was  one  of  those  "  problematic  natures  "  in  which  the 
period  was  so  rich ;  he  lived  isolated  from  the  world 
and  suffered  keenly  under  its  rebuffs.  His  two  most 
important  dramas,  JDer _Erbforster  (1850)  and  Die 
Makkabaer_  (1853),  are,  to  a  certain  extent,  supplementary 
to  Hebbel's ;  they  are  no  less  modern,  but  in  quite  a 
different  way.  Ludwig  is  a  realist,  in  so  far  as  his 
strength  lay  in  the  observance  of  detail  and  the  faithful 
reproduction  of  milieu ;  and  although  he  avoids  the 
complicated  psychological  realism  of  Hebbel's  character- 
drawing,  character  is  to  him  no  less  the  mainspring  of 
dramatic  action.  But  Ludwig's  dramatic  work  suffered 
from  his  preoccupation  with  theory  and  a  self-conscious- 
ness which  led  him  to  model  and  remodel  his  work  until 
it  lost  all  its  original  spontaneity.  He  was,  as  is  to  be  seen 
from  his  Shakespeare- Studien,  an  uncompromising  admirer 
of  Shakespeare,  and  this  blinded  him  to  the  merits  of 
other  dramatists  and  other  forms  of  the  drama.  His 
comedies  are  ineffective,  and  Der  Erbforster,  in  spite 
of  its  somewhat  sensational  and  melodramatic  plot,  has 
remained  the  only  one  of  his  plays  which  is  still  occa- 
sionally to  be  seen  on  the  stage.  As  a  novelist,  how- 
ever, Ludwig  is  still  a  very  real  force  in  German  litera- 
ture. Here  his  finely  chiselled  style,  the  delicacy  of  his 
descriptions  of  nature,  and  his  delight  in  the  infinitely 
little,  found  far  fuller  scope  than  in  the  drama.  His 
Zwischen  Himmel  und  Erde  (1856)  is  one  of  the  finest 
German  stories  of  the  middle  of  the  century ;  and  its 
perfect  sincerity  makes  it  as  fresh  and  vital  to-day  as 
when  it  was  written.  Hardly  less  interesting  are  the 
two  stories  of  Thuringian  village  life,  Die  Heiteretei  and 
Aus  dem  Regen  in  die  Traufe  (1857). 

Of  the  three  dramatists  born  in  the  year  1813,  Richard 
Wagner  (1813-83)  undoubtedly  left  the  deepest  mark  on 


LUDWIG    AND    WAGNER.  269 

his  time;    but  Wagner  had  the  advantage    of  being   not 
only  a  born  dramatist,  but  also  a  musician  of  the  first 
rank.      Born    in    Leipzig,    he    went    through    a    musical 
apprenticeship  in   provincial   German   theatres;    in    1839 
he   visited   Paris    in    the    quest    of  a   success   he    could 
not  find  at  home.     The  disappointments  and  privations 
of  these  Paris  years  are  reflected  in  the  stories  of  Eiu^. 
deutscher  Musiker  in  Paris   (1840-41).       Meanwhile  his 
one "  -Tgrana  "  opera,  J&enzi  (1842),  had  met  with  some 
favour  in  Germany,  and  in  Paris  he  wrote  Der  fliegende 
Hollander^^^\  on  a  weird  ballad-like  theme,  which 
broke  with  the  operatic  traditions  of  the  time.     This  was 
followed  by  the  two  music-dramas,  Tannhduser  und  der 
Sdngerkrieg  auf  Wartburg  (1845)  *&&  Lohengrin  (1850). 
These  are  typically  Romantic  works,  Romantic  both  in 
form  and  ideas ;  and  they  remained  throughout  the  whole 
nineteenth  century  Wagner's  most  popular  operas.      In 
1849    ne   was    involved   in    the   revolutionary   movement 
in    Dresden   and   obliged   to   flee   to  Switzerland.     Here 
he  wrote  the  three  treatises  which  contain  the  theoretical 
principles    of    his    art,    Die    Kunst    und   die    Revolution 
(1849),    D_as  Kunstwerk  der  Zukunft  (1850),   and   Oper 
und  JDrama^iS^i).      In    these   books   Wagner   brought 
to  clear  expression  ideas  that  had  busied  Gentian  writers 
on  the  theory  of  the  drama  since  the  eighteenth  century  ; 
he    maintained   that   the   highest  model  for  the  national 
drama  of  the  Germans  was  the  drama  of  ancient  Greece  ; 
that  is  to  say,  music,   acting,   and  painting,  should  lend 
their  combined  aid  to  interpret  a  dramatic  theme  of  national 
significance.   Above  all,  he  insisted  that  music  should  again 
Become  what"  it  had  been  in  earlier   times,   a  means   to 
the   dramatic   and  poetic   end,   and   not,   as   the   Italians 
of  the   early   nineteenth   century   had    made   it,    an    end 
in  itself. 

The  trilogy,  or  rather  tetralogy,  Per  Jling  jles  Nibe- 
htngen,  written  in  1853,  is  an  illustration  of  what 
Wagner  regarded  as  a  German  national  drama.  The 
poem  was  not  published  until  ten  years  later,  and  its 
musical  composition  occupied  him,  with  interruptions, 


270  NEW    BEGINNINGS    IN    THE    DRAMA. 

from  1853  to  1870.  The  two  first  dramas,  Das  Rhein- 
gold  and  Die  Walkiire,  were  performed  at  Munich  in 
1869  and  1870;  the  other  two,  Siegfried  and  Gqtter^- 
ddmmerung,  not  until  1876,  when  the  whole  work  was 
produced  in  the  "  Festspielhaus "  at  Bayreuth.  This 
performance  of  Der  Ring  des  Nibelungen,  which  Wagner 
carried  through  in  spite  of  almost  insuperable  difficulties, 
might  be  described  as  the  first  national  achievement  of 
German  art,  after  the  establishment  of  the  new  empire. 
Der  Ring  des  Nibelungen  is  written  in  a  kind  of  allitera- 
tive verse,  this  being  in  Wagner's  opinion  better  adapted 
for  singing  than  rhymed  verse;  and  it  is  based  to  a 
larger  extent  on  the  Scandinavian  sagas  than  on  the 
German  Nibelungenlied.  Wagner  fused  the  story  of  the 
Vohungasaga  with  the  German  traditions  of  Siegfried  and 
the  Burgundians,  and  retained  the  mythological  back- 
ground of  the  northern  saga.  By  this  means  he  was  able  to 
utilise  picturesque  events  that  appealed  to  his  imagination, 
such  as  the  rainbow-bridge  to  Valhalla,  Briinnhilde's  fire- 
girt  mountain,  and  Siegfried's  fight  with  the  dragon,  and 
to  embody  in  the  whole  an  ethic  idea  which  assumes 
grandiose  proportions  in  the  final  catastrophe  of  the 
"twilight  of  the  gods."  Der  Ring  des  Nibelungen  gives 
joice  to  the  pessimism  of  the  nineteenth  century  as 
hardly  another  work  of  its  time;  poets  like  Lenau  and 
Leopardi  have  given  finer,  more  intimately  personal  ex- 
pression to  their  despair,  but  Wagner  rises  superior  to 
purely  personal  issues ;  his  pessimism  is  closely  akin  to 
Schopenhauer's,  with  whose  work  he  was  not,  however, 
familiar  until  after  his  poem  was  written. 

More  closely  identified  with  Schopenhauer's  philosophy 
is  the  pessimism  of  the  music-drama  Tristan  und  Isolde 
(1865),  where,  with  a  masterly  command  of  dramatic 
effect,  Wagner  succeeded  in  forging  out  of  the  loose  and 
endless  narrative  of  Gottfried's  poem  a  love-tragedy  of 
Greek  dignity  and  strength.  In  1868  followed  Die 
Meistersinger  von  Niirnberg,  in  which  he  endeavoured  to 
realise  that  ideal  of  the  Romantic  theorists,  a  national 
German  comedy  which  should  embody  the  life  and 


MINOR    DRAMATISTS.  271 

aspirations  of  the  German  "Volk."  For  Die  Meister- 
singer,  Wagner  not  only  made  extensive  studies  in  the 
literature  of  the  sixteenth  century,  but  he  also  borrowed 
situations  and  motives  from  Hoffmann's  Meister  Martin 
der  Kufner  und  seine  Gesellen,  and  a  drama  Hans  Sachs, 
by  an  Austrian  dramatist,  J.  L.  Deinhardstein.  From 
jiie  purely  literary  point  of  view,  it  is  his  most  notable 
creation  ;  no  other  German  dramatist  of  the  century  has 
handled  so  complicated  a  theme  with  such  technical 
mastery  and  such  apparent  spontaneity  as  he  has  done 
here.  His  last  drama,  Parsifal,  a  dramatisation  of 
Wolfram's  epic,  as  Tristan  iind  Isolde  had  been  of 
Gottfried's,  was  produced  in  1882.  The  serene  beauty 
and  religious  earnestness  of  this  poem  presents  still 
another  phase  of  Wagner's  genius.  Parsifal  is  steeped, 
like  its  predecessor,  in  pessimism,  but  it  is  a  transfigured 
pessimism  ;  for  Wagner  had  gone  the  way  of  all  pessi- 
mists, and  turned  to  the  fatalism  of  the  East.  But  by 
1882  the  spell  of  Schopenhauer  on  the  German  mind 
had  ceased  to  be  all-powerful,  and  the  younger  gener- 
ation was  beginning  to  face  life  with  more  energy  and 
hopefulness ;  Parsifal  was  felt  rather  to  represent  the 
close  of  its  era  than  the  beginning  of  a  new  one. 

The  other  dramatic  literature  of  this  period  is  of  com- 
paratively small  account ;  in  the  fifties  and  sixties  the 
theatre  was  almost  exclusively  dominated  by  "Young 
German "  ideas,  and  the  playwrights  who  wrote  for  it, 
such  as  Robert  Griepenkerl  (i 810-68),  R.  von  Gottschall 
(1823-1910),  O.  von  Redwitz  (1823-91),  and  A.  E. 
Brachvogel  (1824-78),  were,  for  the  most  part,  belated 
"Young  Germans."  The  most  popular  playwrights,  the 
successors  of  Iffland  and  Kotzebue,  were  Roderich 
Benedix  (181 1-73)  and  Charlotte  Birch-Pfeiffer  (1800-68). 
In  the  following  decade  the  German  theatre  suffered 
under  the  importation  of  French  plays,  and  such  serious 
writing  as  there  was,  tended  to  fall  back  into  imitations 
of  Schiller's  drama.  It  was  not  until  the  beginning  of 
the  eighties  that  there  was  much  hope  for  a  removal 
of  the  stagnation  into  which  theatre  and  drama  had 


272  THE    MUNICH    SCHOOL. 

fallen  in  Germany ;    meanwhile  the  initiative  of  Hebbel 
was  forgotten. 

In  the  epoch  before  the  Franco-German  War  the  only 
group  of  writers  to  whom  the  word  "  School "  could  be 
applied  was  that  which  the  Bavarian  king,  Maximilian 
II.,  gathered  round  him  in  Munich  from  abouT'TS^oT 
inwards.  The  chief  of  these  writers,  in  the  earlier 
period  at  least,  was  Emanuel  Geibe.1  (1815-84),  who  has 
already  been  mentioned  as  a  contributor  to  the  poli- 
tical lyric  of  the  earlier  generation.  His  share  in  that 
movement  was  restricted  to  a  collection  of  poems  entitled 
Ztitstimmen  (1841),  the  tone  of  which,  moreover,  is 
conciliatory  and  anti-revolutionary.  Geibel's  Juniuslieder 
(1847)  contain,  however,  some  of  the  most  inspired  purely 
lyric  poetry  of  the  revolutionary  epoch.  In  1851  he 
accepted  the  royal  invitation  to  Munich  and  spent  seven 
years  there,  the  most  productive  years  of  his  life.  To  this 
period  belong  the  longer  poems,  Der  Mythus  vom  Dampf, 
Der  Bildhauer  des  Hadrian,  Der  Tod  des  Tiberius,  and 
the  cycle  of  lyrics,  Ada,  in  memory  of  his  wife,  whom 
he  lost  in  1855,  all  of  these  being  included  in  the  collec- 
tion of  Neue  Gedichte  (1857).  Geibel  was  the  heir  of  the 
vast  literary  tradition  of  the  Romantic  lyric,  and  it  proved 
too  much  for  him ;  his  own  poetic  individuality  was 
not  strong  enough  to  allow  him  to  strike  out  a  distinctive 
path  for  himself.  Gifted  with  undeniable  lyric  powers,  he 
has  left  less  mark  on  the  development  of  German  poetry 
than  any  other  of  the  greater  lyric  poets.  Geibel  was 
also  a  dramatist,  but  his  plays,  of  which  the  comedy, 
Meister  Andrea  (1855),  and  the  drama,  Brunhild  (1858), 
the  subject  of  which  is  drawn  from  the  Nibelungenlied, 
may  be  mentioned,  are  deficient  in  dramatic  force  and  in 
understanding  for  the  needs  of  the  theatre. 

Friedrich  Bodenstedt  (1819-92),  another  poet  of  the 
Munich  circle,  made  his  reputation  with  a  single  book,  the 
Lieder  des  Mirza  Schaffy  (1851),  which  was  extraordinarily 
popular  in  its  day.  There  is,  however,  little  originality 
either  of  thought  or  lyric  inspiration  behind  his  some- 
what shallow  imitations  of  oriental  poetry,  and  the 


J.    V.    VON    SCHEFFEL.  273 

interest  in  them  soon  waned.  Graf  Adolf  Friedrich  von 
Schack  (1815-94)  is  better  remembered  nowadays  as  an 
art-patron  than  as  a  man  of  letters  ;  his  original  verse 
does  not  display  much  talent,  but  he  made  some  admir- 
able translations  of  oriental,  Spanish,  and  Portuguese 
poets,  and  his  Geschichte  der  dramatischen  Literatur  und 
Kunst  in  Spanien  (1845-46)  established  his  reputation  as 
an  authority  on  Spanish  literature.  Other  poets  of  the 
circle  were  the  unhappy  Heinrich  Leuthold  (1827-79), 
whose  Gedichte  (1879)  have  something  of  the  tragic 
earnestness  of  Lenau's  pessimism  ;  Hermann  Lingg  (1820- 
95),  the  author  of  an  ambitious  epic,  Die  Volkenvanderung 
(1866-68),  and  Martin  Greif  (the  pseudonym  of  Hermann 
Frey,  1839-1911),  whose  lyrics  and  dramas,  although 
written  under  Romantic  influences,  show  no  signs  of 
Romantic  decadence. 

One  of  the  most  widely  popular  writers  of  the  Munich 
circle  was  Joseph  Viktor  von  Scheffel  (1826-86).  His 
poetry,  especially  the  verse-romance  Der  Tromfcter  von 
Sdkkingen  (1854),  has  verve  and  charm,  in  spite  of  an 
excess  of  that  sentimentality  which  was  the  least  valuable 
heritage  of  Romanticism  ;  it  appealed  exactly  to  the 
tastes  of  the  day,  and  gives  an  idea,  if  not  of  the 
best  the  Munich  poets  could  do,  at  least  of  the  public 
taste  to  which  they  had  to  appeal.  On  a  higher  level 
stands  Scheffel's  historical  romance,  JEkkehard^  eine 
Geschichte  aus  dem  zehnten  Jahrhundert  (1857),  an  excel- 
lent historical  novel,  in  which  the  author  was  poet  enough 
not  to  substitute,  as  so  many  of  his  conhMiiporarii's  did. 
mere  antiquarian  research  for  poetic  imagination.  Scheffel 
made  the  story  in  verse  popular,  and  he  had  several  more 
or  less  successful  followers,  such  as  Julius  Wolff  (1834- 
1910),  author  of  Der  Rattenf anger  von  Hameln  (1875) 
and  Der  wilde  Jdger  (1877),  Rudolf  Baumbach  (1840- 
1905),  whose  Zlatorog  appeared  in  1878,  and  F.  W.  Weber 
( 1 8 1 3-94).  The  last-mentioned  of  these  was  a  Westphalian 
catholic,  of  manly  and  independent  talent :  his  epic 
romance  Dreizehnlinden  (1878),  in  spite  of  a  somewhat 
obtrusive  religious  tendency,  certainly  deserved  its  popu- 

s 


274  THE    MUNICH    SCHOOL. 

larity.  These  years  appear  to  have  also  brought  a  certain 
revival  of  popular  interest  in  the  epic ;  the  most  original 
representative  of  this  form  of  poetry  was  Wilhelm  Jordan 
(1819-1904).  Jordan  began  his  career  in  the  political 
epoch  ;  his  philosophy,  which  obtrudes  to  an  excessive 
degree  in  his  poetry,  is  that  of  the  scientific  reaction  at 
the  middle  of  the  century,  and  his  chief  work,  the  epic 
Die  Nibelunge  (1869-72),  is  in  its  patriotic  fervour  not 
free  from  the  tendencies  of  the  "  Young  German  "  epoch. 
But  Jordan,  no  doubt,  impressed  his  contemporaries  by 
his  vigorous  personality,  his  imagination,  and  his  zeal. 
About  the  same  time,  poets  like  Karl  Simrock  (1802-76) 
and  Wilhelm  Hertz  (1835-1902)  were,  with  their  excellent 
translations,  making  the  great  Middle  High  German  epics 
themselves  a  force  in  modern  life. 

The  undeniable  lack  of  artistic  seriousness  in  the  litera- 
ture of  the  Munich  group  was  atoned  for  by  a  strongly 
marked  pessimistic  strain.  In  this  period  the  zenith  of 
German  pessimism  was  reached ;  it  had  been  made 
palatable  to  the  time  by  Eduard  von  Hartmann  (1834- 
1906),  with  his  Philosophic  des  Unbewussten  (1869),  a 
kind  of  compromise  between  the  pessimism  of  Scho- 
penhauer and  Hegelianism.  In  literature  the  pessimistic 
note  is  to  be  found  in  the  verse  of  Heinrich  Leuthold, 
who  has  just  been  mentioned,  and  in  the  still  more 
despairing  Gedichte  (1870)  of  the  deaf  and  ultimately 
blind  Moravian  poet  Heinrich  Landesmann,  who  wrote 
under  the  name  of  "  Hieronymus  Lorm "  (1821-1902). 
Sombre,  too,  in  spite  of  occasional  exotic  touches,  is 
the  poetry  of  Ferdinand  von  Schmid,  known  to  literature 
as  "  Dranmor "  (1823-88).  The  chief  representative  of 
pessimism  among  the  poets  of  this  age  was,  however,  the 
Austrian  Robert  Hamerling  (1838-89),  whose  reputation 
rests  on  two  epics, _Ahasver  in  Rom  (1866),  on  the  theme 
of  the  Wandering  Jew,  and  J9gr  JCo^gpon  -$f{>n  <"i86o\  a 
historical  epic  dealing  with  thensing  of  the  Anabaptists  in 
Miinster  in  1534.  These  are  perhaps  the  most  ambitious 
experiments  in  epic  poetry  which  the  age  has  to  show. 
Hamerling  was  unquestionably  highly  gifted  ;  he  had 


R.    HAMERLING;    K.    F.    MEYER.  275 

grandiose  ideas,  a  sense  for  colour  and  splendour,  and  a 
mastery  of  dramatic  effects  ;  and  yet,  in  spite  of  all  this, 
the  reader  is  conscious  of  a  certain  emptiness  in  his 
verse,  a  suspicion  of  lack  of  sincerity,  which  reduces 
the  general  impression  of  his  work  to  one  of  rhetoric  and 
theatrical  effect.  Hamerling's  poetry  has  not,  it  must  be 
admitted,  stood  the  test  of  time  well.  A  drama,  Danton 
Robespierre  (1871),  a  philosophic  novel,  Aspasia  (1876), 
and  a  satire  on  modern  life,  Homunculus  (1888),  failed 
to  win  the  enthusiastic  admiration  which  had  greeted  the 
epics. 

The  chief  representative  of  the  novel  in  the  Munich 
circle  was  Paul  Heyse,  who  has  already  been  discussed 
in  an  earlier  chapter  ;  and  with  him  might  be  associated 
W.  H.  Riehl  (1823-97),  whose  finely  chiselled  Kultur- 
geschichtliche  Novellen  (1856)  must  be  numbered  among 
the  best  short  stories  of  the  time.  But  the  master  of 
the  "  Novelle "  in  this  age  was  a  fellow-countryman  of 
Gottfried  Keller,  Konrad  Ferdinand  Meyer  (1825-98). 
Meyer,  who  made  a  name  for  himself  as  a  lyric  and 
epic  poet  before  he  turned  to  fiction,  has  left  us  a  series 
of  short  stories,  all  distinguished  by  a  polished  style  and 
perfect  workmanship.  Jiirg  Jenatsch  appeared  in  1876, 
Der  Heilige,  a  story  of  Thomas  a  Becket,  in  1880,  and 
these  were  followed  in  rapid  succession  by  Das  Amulet, 
Der  Schuss  von  der  Kanzel,  Plautus  im  Nonnenkloster, 
Die  Hochzeit  des  Monchs,  and  Die  Versuchung  des  Pescara. 
As  a  stylist  Meyer  has  an  Austrian  counterpart  in 
Ferdinand  von  Saar  (1845-1906),  whose  Novellen  aus 
Osterreich  (1877-97)  are,  however,  tinged  by  a  pessimism 
which  is  foreign  to  Meyer's  robuster  genius.  The  longer 
novel  of  this  epoch  is  represented  by  W.  Jensen  (born 
1837)  and  A.  Wilbrandt  (1837-1911),  of  whom  the  latter 
endeavoured  to  keep  pace  with  more  modern  develop- 
ments of  German  fiction,  even  although  he  remained 
in  style  and  manner  faithful  to  the  older  school.  Wil- 
brandt was  also  a  dramatist  of  some  distinction,  but  his 
conservative  tendencies  are  more  marked  in  his  drama 
than  in  his  fiction.  The  chief  humourists  of  the  period 


276  THE    MUNICH    SCHOOL. 

are  Wilhelm  Raabe  (1831-1910),  whose  work  has  a 
Dickensian  flavour,  without  Dickens's  optimism ;  and 
Wilhelm  Busch  (1832-1908),  author  of  the  famous  Max 
und  Moritz  (1865),  Der  heilige  Antonins  (1870),  and 
other  poems,  in  which  the  wit  is  often  eclipsed  by 
somewhat  cruel  irony. 

The  period  during  which  the  Munich  School  domin- 
ated German  literature  was,  although  unproductive  of 
work  of  the  first  order  in  poetry,  markedly  active  in  other 
fields ;  it  was  the  age  in  which  Germany  under  Bismarck 
was  fighting  her  way  to  the  front  rank  of  European 
peoples.  This  alone  diverted  the  attention  of  the  Ger- 
mans from  literature,  and  it  is  not  surprising  that  in  a 
time  of  such  great  political  changes  the  interest  in  histori- 
cal studies  should  have  shown  no  abatement.  As  the 
representative  historian  of  this  later  period,  Heinrich  von 
Treitsr.hke  (1834-96)  may  be  mentioned,  whose  most  im- 
portant work  is  \\\sDei<tsche  Geschichte  im  neunzehnten  Jahr- 
hundert  (1879-94).  In  the  train  of  history  came  a  whole 
new  science  of  "  Kulturgeschichte."  The  history  of  art 
was  taken  up  again  by  German  writers  with  enthusiasm  and 
judgment,  and  in  literary  history  and  criticism  Hermann 
Hettner  (1821-82),  Rudolf  Haym  (1821-1901),  Karl 
Hillebrand  (1829-84),  and  Wilhelm  Scherer  (1828-1901), 
laid  the  basis  for  a  more  sincere  and  healthy  attitude 
to  literature  than  had  been  possible  as  long  as  "Young 
German "  tendencies  were  in  the  air. 


277 


CHAPTER   XXV. 

GERMAN    LITERATURE    SINCE     1870. 

IT  is  perhaps  less  easy  in  the  case  of  German  literature 
during  the  last  generation  to  form  a  judgment  that  can 
lay  claim  to  finality,  than  in  that  of  any  other  European 
literature  in  the  same  period.  Even  Italy  affords  in 
her  recent  literature  no  parallel  to  the  change  of  intel- 
lectual horizon  in  Germany  brought  about  by  the  new 
political  conditions ;  for  the  creation  of  the  kingdom  of 
Italy  could  hardly  be  compared  with  Germany's  realisa- 
tion of  what  all  her  intellectual  leaders  since  the  new- 
birth  of  the  nation  in  the  Napoleonic  era  had  dreamed. 
It  is  thus  not  surprising  to  find  in  the  literature  of  modern 
Germany  a  certain  tentative  experimenting,  which  has 
resulted  from  the  conscious  desire  to  imperialise  it,  as 
it  were,  and  to  bring  it  into  harmony  with  the  altered 
ideals  of  the  national  life.  And  with  this  experiment- 
ing has  also  come  a  lack  of  critical  balance- — on  the 
one  hand  a  jubilant  over-confidence  in  the  splendour 
of  achievement,  on  the  other,  an  equally  reprehensible 
contempt  for  the  insignificance  of  poetic,  as  contrasted 
with  political  achievement.  But  since  1871,  or  at  least 
since  the  eighties,  when  the  new  generation  of  citizens  of 
the  Empire  began  to  take  over  the  leadership,  Germany 
has,  it  must  at  least  be  said,  been  more  in  earnest  about 
her  literature  and  inspired  by  more  serious  ideals  than 
any  other  people  in  Europe. 

The  general  tendency  of  the  age  has  been,  like  that  of 
the   Romantic   period   at    the    beginning  of  the   century, 


278  GERMAN    LITERATURE    SINCE    1870. 

towards  bringing  life  and  literature  into  closer  touch  with 
each  other,  and  infusing  more  "holy  earnestness"  into 
the  pursuit  of  art  and  poetry.  The  literature  before  the 
war,  based  as  it,  for  the  most  part,  was  on  a  threadbare 
and  effete  tradition  of  the  idealism  of  Schiller,  had  to 
give  place — under  the  influence  of  foreign  masters  like 
Flaubert,  De  Maupassant,  and  Zola,  of  Turgenev,  Dostoev- 
sky,  and  Tolstoi,  and  of  Ibsen,  Bjornson,  and  Strindberg 
— to  a  new  realism  which  was  determined  to  be  done 
with  false  conventions  of  poetry  and  to  make  literature 
once  more  the  direct  expression  of  the  life  and  thought  of 
the  day.  As  an  inevitable  consequence  of  this  reaction, 
Schiller,  the  acknowledged  national  poet  of  the  greater 
jjart :  of  the  .nineteenth  century,  had  to  yield  the  first 
place  in  the  national  esteem  to  the  master  of  classic 
realism,  Goethe.  Along  with  this  change  came  an  inevit- 
able change  in  the  philosophic  horizon.  Hegel,  whose 
magic  web  had  so  long  lain  over  German  thought,  was  at 
last  deposed ;  his  philosophy  succumbed  before  a  revival 
of  interest  in  the  great  master  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
Kant ;  in  the  same  way  the  renunciatory  fervour  of 
Schopenhauer,  who  had  only  just  entered  into  his  kingdom 
in  German  thought  in  the  years  before  the  war.  had  to 
yield  to  a  new  optimism,  which  believed  in  the  power  of 
the  will  and  the  personality.  This  new  individualism 
attained  its'  mature  expression  %vith  the  most  gifted  writer_ 
of  the  last  generation  in  Germany,  Friedrich  Nietzsche. 

Born  at  Rocken  near  Liitzen  in  1844,  Nietzsche  first 
distinguished  himself  as  a  classical  scholar,  and  became 
in  1869  Professor  of  Classics  in  Basel.  In  1879  he  was 
obliged  to  resign  his  chair  owing  to  continued  ill-health, 
and  for  the  next  ten  years  he  led  an  unsettled  life  at 
Swiss  and  Italian  health-resorts;  in  1889  he  became 
insane,  and  he  died  at  Weimar  in  1900.  He  began  as 
a  disciple  of  Schopenhauer's  and  a  warm  admirer  of 
Richard  Wagner's,  and  in  1872  published  Die  Geburt  der 
Tragbdie  aus  dem  Geiste  der  Musik,  a  study  of  dramatic 
origins  suggested  by  Wagner's  theories.  Between  1873 
and  1876  followed  four  Unzeitgemasse  Betrachtungen,  in 


FRIEDRICH    NIETZSCHE.  279 

which  Nietzsche  appears  as  the  antagonist  of  many  of 
the  most  cherished  ideas  of  his  time;  he  attacked  the 
self-sufficiency  of  his  countrymen  after  the  war,  especially 
D.  F.  Strauss's  Der  alte  und  der  neue  Glaicbe  (1872),  and 
he  pointed  to  Schopenhauer  and  Wagner  as  the  libera- 
tors of  the  age  from  its  shallow  "  culture  "  and  the  dead 
hand  of  Hegelianism.  Before,  however,  the  last  of  these 
Betrachtungen  had  appeared,  a  breach  had  been  formed 
between  himself  and  Wagner.  Although  outwardly  caused 
by  the  repugnance  with  which  Nietzsche  regarded  his 
friend's  methods  of  realising  his  ideals,  the  quarrel  was 
at  bottom  due  to  a  fundamental  irreconcilability  between 
the  two  men.  Nietzsche's  individualism  and  optimism 
were  repelled  by  the  resigned  pessimism  of  Wagner's  later 
creations;  as  he  outgrew  Schopenhauer,  it  was  impossible 
jbr  him  to  remain  Wagnerian,  and  towards  the  end  of 
his  career  his  antagonism  to  Wagner  became  extremely 
marked.  The  chief  writings  of  Nietzsche's  later  period 
are  Menschliches,  Alhumenschliches  (1878-80),  Morgenrote 
(1881),  Die  frohliche  Wissenschaft  (1882),  which  lead  up 
to  his  masterpiece,  Also  sprach  Zarathustra  (1883-91). 
This  remarkable  worlc7  half  poetry,  half  philosophy,  in 
which  Nietzsche,  under  trie  guise  of  a  poetic  orientalism, 
IJeeTcs  refuge  from  the  deadening  round  of  repetition  in  a 
doctrine  of  a  higher  and  nobler  manhood,  is  the  greatest 
work  of  the  last  generation  in  German,  and  possibly  in 
European  literature.  Apart  from  its  ideas,  which  like  all 
world-compelling  ideas  have  called  forth  a  virulent  con- 
troversy, the  melodious,  biblical  beauty  of  Nietzsche's 
language  gives  Also  sprach  Zaraihustra  a  place  among 
the  masterpieces  of  modern  prose  literature.  In  1886 
followed  Jenseits  von  Gut  und  Bose,  then  Zur  Genealogie 
der  Moral,  and  lastly  Gotzen-Dammerung.  The  comple- 
tion of  a  fundamental  work  in  which  Nietzsche  proposed 
to  gather  up  the  threads  of  his  philosophy,  Per  Wille  zur 
M^^hii  was  prevented  by  the  final  catastrophe  in  his  life. 
Nietzsche  is  an  individualist  and  an  optimist ;  he 
declares  war  alike  on  Hegel  and  on  Schopenhauer;  he 
sees  the  salvation  of  the  race  in  the  subordination  of  the 


28O  GERMAN    LITERATURE    SINCE    1870. 

herd    to   the    great,    strong    man,    the   "  Ubermensich.* 

Altruism  is  no  longer  in  his  eyes  a  virtue,  but  a  sign  of 
weakness.  In  this  assertion  of  individualism  Nietzsche 
presents  an  interesting  parallel  to  the  Romantic  philo- 
sophers and  poets  who,  nearly  a  century  earlier,  combated 
the  levelling  forces  of  the  "Aufklarung"  with  a  similarly 
uncompromising  assertion  of  the  rights  of  the  individual. 
In  his  style  and  method  of  presenting  his  ideas,  Nietzsche 
also  resembles  very  closely  such  Romanticists  as  Novalis, 
Friedrich  Schlegel,  and  Holderlin  ;  like  these  writers  he 
is  a  thinker  in  aphorisms  and  an  artist  in  the  handling 
of  words. 

Again,  as  in  the  Romantic  era,  the  lyric  was  the  first 
form  of  literature  to  benefit  by  the  revival  of  individualism. 
Nietzsche  himself  was  a  lyric  poet  of  no  small  powers — 
his  Gedichte  und  Spriiche  were  first  collected  in  1897 — 
and  his  influence  is  to  be  traced  on  all  the  younger  poets 
of  the  time.  The  revival  of  the  modern  lyric  is  usually 
dated  from  the  Adjutantenritte  und  andere  Gedichte  (i&%£) 
of  Detlev  von  Liliencron  (1844-1909),  a  volume  of  virile 
and  original  verse.  Liliencron  set  the  fashion,  and  in  his 
train  the  young  poets  of  the  time  made  a  determined 
attempt  to  throw  off  the  Romantic  traditions  and  to 
create  a  new  type  of  lyric  expression  in  accordance  with 
the  spirit  of  the  time.  Their  success  seems  the  more 
remarkable  when  one  remembers  how  strong  the  tradi- 
tions were  against  which  they  had  to  fight.  Of  these 
poets  mention  may  be  made  of  G.  Falke  (born  1853), 
F.  Avenarius  (born  1856),  Arno  Holz  (born  1863), 
K.  Henckell  (born  1864),  K.  Busse  (born  1872),  and 
more  especially  Richard  Dehmel  (born  1863),  M.  Dau- 
thendey  (born  1867),  and  Stefan  George  (born  1868). 
The  lighter  lyric  of  the  so-called  "  Uberbrettl "  has  been 
successfully  cultivated  by  O.  J.  Bierbaum  (1865-1910). 
Other  forms  of  verse  were,  in  this  age  of  dominant 
realism,  not  much  in  favour,  but  mention  may  at  least 
be  made  of  the  epic,  Das  Lied  der  Menschheit  (1887  ff.), 
by  the  brothers  Ffeinrich  (born  1855)  and  Julius  Hart 
(1859-1906). 


LYRIC    AND    DRAMA.  281 

The  drama,  too,  benefited  from  the  individualistic 
revival,  and  it  was  fortunate  in  finding  a  splendidly 
equipped  national  theatre  prepared  for  it.  Wagner's 
reform  of  the  theatre,  together  with  the  example  set  by 
the  Duke  of  Meiningen  in  his  Court  Theatre  between 
1866  and  1889,  has  raised  the  stage  in  Germany  as  an 
institution,  to  a  rank  it  has  never  occupied  before  in 
Europe.  Every  town  has  now  its  established  theatre, 
and  prides  itself  on  a  repertory  which  includes  not  only 
the  classical  dramas  of  German  literature,  but  also  those 
of  Sophocles  and  Shakespeare,  Calderon  and  Moliere.  It 
would  thus  have  been  surprising  had  a  revival  of  literary 
activity  in  Germany  not  taken  advantage  in  the  first 
instance  of  the  theatre.  The  new  dramatic  literature 
inspired  by  French,  Scandinavian,  and  Russian  realism 
elates  from  the  early  works  of  Sudermann  and  Hauptmann 
at  the  end  of  the  eighties,  but  the.  preparation  of  the 
preceding  decade  is  also  of  interest.  Men  like  the 
now  forgotten  Albert  Lindner  (1831-88)  and  the  Austrian 
poet,  Franz  Nissel  (1831-93),  did  not,  in  spite  of  their 
gifts,  succeed  in  leaving  any  permanent  mark  on  dramatic 
literature;  and  even  dramatists  with  modern  ideas  like 
Arthur  Fitger  (1840-1909)  and  F.  von  Saar  (1833-1906), 
who  has  been  already  mentioned,  were  unable  to  assert 
themselves  in  the  rapid  development  of  dramatic  literature. 
It  seemed,  however,  for  a  time  as  if  Ernst  von  Wilden- 
bruch  (1845-1909)  might  have  saved  the  traditions  of 
national  historical  tragedy  with  his  dramas  on  themes 
from  national  history,  such  as  Die  Quitzows  (1888)  and 
Heinrich  und  Heinrichs  Geschlecht  (1896);  but  Wilden- 
bruch's  talent  was  of  too  superficial  and  theatrical  a  kind 
to  satisfy  an  age  of  realistic  demands.  A  more  genuine 
poet  of  the  time  was  Ludwig  Anzengruber  (1839-89),  who 
wrote  powerful  and  effective  dramas  of  Austrian  peasant 
life;  his  Pfarrer  von  Kirchfeld  (1870),  Der  Meineidbauer 
(1871),  Die  Kreuzelschreiber  (1872),  Der  G'wissenswurtn 
(1874),  and  Doppelselbstmord  (1874)  have,  in  spite  of 
their  dialect,  which  limits  their  appeal,  high  value.  Only 
in  their  technique,  which  is  a  little  out  of  date  now, 


282  GERMAN    LITERATURE    SINCE    1870. 

and  in  their  occasional  lapses  into  a  sentimentality  which 
belongs  to  the  conventions  of  literature  rather  than  to  life, 
do  we  feel  that  they  belong  to  an  age  that  has  passed. 

Hermann  Sudermann  (born  1857)  is  a  dramatic  realist 
wbicTTearried  his  best  lessons  from  France,  and  his  plays 
have  in  consequence  attained  a  European  celebrity.  He 
began  as  a  novelist,  and  in  Frau  Sorge  (1887)  produced 
one  of  the  best  modern  German  stories ;  this  was  followed 
by  a  romance  of  the  Napoleonic  invasion,  Der  Katzensteg 
(1889).  His  later  works  of  fiction,  such  as  Es  war  (1894) 
and  Das  hohe  Lied  (1908),  deal  with  interesting  ethical 
conflicts  and  problems,  but  with  a  tendency  to  sensational- 
ism both  of  plot  and  style.  The  production  of  Sudermann's 
first  play,  Die  Ehre,  in  1888,  marked  the  beginning  of 
the  new  period  in  the  history  of  the  German  theatre ;  its 
peculiar  power  lay  in  the  treatment  of  an  idea  of  very 
"  actual  "  interest  with  a  realism  hitherto  unknown  to  the 
German  stage.  Die  Ehre  was  followed  by  a  long  series 
of  dramas  of  modern  life,  of  which  the  most  interesting 
are  Sodoms  Ende  (1890),  ff&LiiLat_  (1893),  Das  Gliick  im 
Winkel  (1895),  Johatmisfeuer  (Tgoo),  and  Es  lebe  das 
Leben  !  (1902).  In  Johannes  (1898)  he  dealt  with  the 
story  of  John  the  Baptist,  providing  it,  after  the  manner 
of  Hebbel,  with  a  modern  psychological  background, 
combined  with  a  realism  to  which  Hebbel  did  not 
aspire.  Since  1902  Sudermann  has  produced  several 
dramas,  but  these  show  no  advance  on  his  earlier  work. 
His  wide  reputation  is  not  undeserved,  for  he  has  suc- 
ceeded in  a  higher  degree  than  even  his  French  masters 
in  combining  effective  theatrical  art  with  characters  and 
ideas  of  vital  interest  to  his  contemporaries  ;  but  he  has 
not  helped  materially  to  solve  the  problem  of  the  German 
national  drama  of  the  future.  His  place  in  the  evolution 
of  the  modern  theatre  is  not  unsimilar  to  that  occupied 
by  Iffland  in  Germany  a  hundred  years  earlier  or,  at  a 
more  recent  date,  by  Dumas  fils  in  France. 

Much  more  was  looked  for  by  the  theorists  and  pro- 
phets of  the  nineties  in  Germany  from  Gerhart  Hauptmann 
(born  1862),  a  native  of  Silesia.  Hauptmann  is  un- 


GERHART    HAUPTMANN.  283 

questionably  the  most  original  German  dramatist  of  this 
period,  but  he  too  has,  so  far,  failed  to  fulfil  the  hopes 
that  were  placed  upon  him.  His  first  drama,  a  crudely 
realistic  tragedy  of  great  promise,  Vor  Sonnenaufgang 
(1889),  followed  closely  on  Sudermann's  Ehre ;  then 
came  Das  Friedensfest  (1890),  and  in  the  following  year 
Einsame  Menschen,  in  the  manner  of  Ibsen.  His  first  im- 
portant drama  was  DJ&.Weber  (1892),  a  powerful  tragedy, 
which  deals  with  the  rising  of  the  Silesian  weavers  in 
1844.  From  this  point  on,  Hauptmann  has  experi- 
mented in  the  most  varied  fields  of  dramatic  writing. 
Besides  full-blooded  realistic  plays  like  Fuhrmann  Henschel 
(1898)  and  Rose  Berndt  (1903),  he  has  given  us  delicate 
psychological  studies  like  Kollege  Grampian  (1892)  and 
Michael  Kramer  (1900),  and  robust  realistic  comedies  such 
zs  Der  Biberpelz  (1893).  Most  interesting  of  all  are  the 
poetic,  imaginative  dramas  which  opened  in  1893  with 
Hanneles  Himmelfahrt,  a  wonderful  reproduction  of  the 
feverish  visions  of  a  dying  child,  which  was  followed  in 
1897  by  the  allegorical  dramatic  fairy-tale  Die  versunkene 
Glocke.  The  last-mentioned  play,  with  its  combination  of 
realistic  Silesian  figures,  fantastic  imaginings,  and  Romantic 
ideas  of  the  artist's  calling,  is  one  of  the  most  interesting 
of  the  whole  period.  The  fantastic  element  predominates 
in  later  plays  of  this  group,  such  as  Schluck  und  Jau 
(1900)  and  Und  Pippa  tanzt !  (1906).  Hauptmann  had 
less  success  with  his  historical  tragedy,  Florian  Geyer 
(1895),  a"d  his  psychological  poetic  dramas  like  Der 
arme  Heinrich  (1902),  Konig  Karls  Geisel  (1908),  and 
Griselda  (1909).  He  is  also  the  author  of  a  remarkable 
novel,  Der  Narr  in  Christo,  Emanuel  Quint  (1911), 
which  reproduces  the  gospel  story  amidst  modern  Silesian 
surroundings.  In  spite  of  his  comparative  lack  of  out- 
ward success,  Hauptmann  is  the  most  interesting  literary 
personality  among  modern  German  dramatists ;  no  one 
has  experimented  in  so  wide  a  range  as  he,  no  one  has 
fought  more  persistently  against  the  tyranny  of  theatrical 
traditions. 

Amongst   the   minor   dramatists    of   this    epoch,    who, 


284  GERMAN    LITERATURE    SINCE    1870. 

together  with  Sudermann  and  Hauptmann,  have  helped 
to  make  the  German  stage  of  to-day  an  arena  of  intel- 
lectual and  artistic  activity,  the  most  important  are 
Richard  Voss  (born  1851),  who  with  his  Alexandra 
(1888),  Schuldig  (1890),  Die  neue  Zeit  (1891),  and  Die 
blonde  Kathrein  (1895),  was  to  some  extent  a  forerunner 
of  the  new  school;  Max  Halbe  (born  1865),  author 
°f  Jugend  (1893);  W.  Kirchbach  (1857-1906);  O.  E. 
Hartleben  (1864-1905)  ;  Ludwig  Fulda  (born  1862), 
author  of  several  graceful,  if  somewhat  conventional 
plays  in  verse,  and  an  excellent  translation  of  Moliere, 
which  has  helped  to  retain  that  writer's  comedies  in 
the  German  repertory,  and  Frank  Wedekind  (born  1864). 
In  Austria  the  drama  has  been  no  less  actively  culti- 
vated, the  leading  writers  here  being  Arthur  Schnitzler 
(born  1862),  author  of  Anatol  (1893),  Liebelei  (1895), 
Der  griine  Kakadu  (1899),  and  Der  junge  Medardus 
(1910);  Hermann  Bahr  (born  1863),  a  critic  of  dis- 
tinction, whose  plays  (Das  Tschaperl,  1898,  Der  Apostel, 
1901,  Das  Konzert,  19,09)  have  had  considerable  pop- 
ularity in  Germany  as  well  as  Austria ;  Hugo  von 
Hofmannsthal  (born  1874),  the  most  poetically  gifted 
of  all,  and  Karl  Schonherr  (born  1869). 

In  face  of  this  absorbing  interest  in  the  theatre  in 
Germany,  it  is  not  surprising  that  the  novel  has  for  a 
time  ceased  to  be  what  it  was  in  the  previous  generation, 
the  main  vehicle  of  ideas ;  but  it,  too,  under  the  influence 
of  realism,  and  more  particularly  of  Scandinavian  and 
Russian  models,  entered  upon  a  phase  of  development 
analogous  to  that  of  the  drama.  What  Sudermann  and 
Hauptmann  were  to  the  latter,  a  writer  of  an  older  genera- 
tion, Theodor  Fontane  (1819-98),  was  to  prose  fiction. 
From  the  historical  novel  (Vor  dem  Sturm,  1878)  Fontane 
gradually  found  his  way  to  realism.  His  modern  novels, 
UAdultera  (1882),  Irrungen,  Wirrungen  (1887),  Stine 
(1890),  .E$z  Briest(\^^}  are  amongst  the  best,  produced 
in  Germany  under  French  influence,  and  the  earliest  of 
them  were  at  once  accepted  as  models  by  the  younger 
writers.  In  the  eighties  and  early  nineties  the  purely 


THE    NOVEL.  285 

realistic  novel,  as  cultivated  by  writers  like  M.  G.  Conrad 
(born  1846),  Max  Kretzer  (born  1854),  K.  Bleibtreu 
(born  1859),  and  H.  Conradi  (1862-90),  predominated. 
But  just  as  Hauptmann  turned  from  naturalism  to  the 
supernaturalism  and  imaginative  faery  of  Hanneles  Him- 
melfahrt  and  Die  versunkene  Glocke,  so  the  German  fiction 
of  the  period  soon  abandoned  the  naturalism  of  the 
French  theorists.  A  younger  generation  has  sprung  up 
which,  without  denying  the  enormous  gain  in  truth  and 
sincerity  which  the  realistic  method  has  brought  with  it, 
employs  that  method  as  a  means  to  a  higher  end,  instead 
of  as  an  end  in  itself.  To  this  group  may  be  numbered 
Wilhelm  von  Polenz  (1861-1903),  Gustav  Frenssen  (born 
1863),  author  of  Jorn  Uhl(i<)oi);  Hermann  Hesse  (born 
1877),  Jakob  Wassermann  (born  1873),  and  above  all, 
Thomas  Mann  (born  1875),  in  whose  Buddenbrooks 
(1901)  the  national  traditions  of  the  middle  of  the 
nineteenth  century  have  been  revived.  The  novel  of  the 
province  in  this  period  is  represented  by  the  Styrian 
writer  Peter  K.  Rosegger  (born  1843),  a  disciple  of 
Anzengruber.  Characteristic  of  the  latest  development 
of  German  fiction  is  also  the  large  number  of  excellent 
novels  by  women-writers,  such  as  Marie  von  Ebner-Esch- 
enbach  (born  1830),  Ricarda  Huch  (born  1864),  Isolde 
Kurz  (born  1862),  Helene  Bohlau  (born  1859),  and 
Klara  Viebig  (born  1860). 

The  nineteenth  century  is  one  of  extraordinary  richness 
and  variety  in  Germany's  literature,  an  epoch  of  more 
momentous  experimenting  and  initiative  than  is  to  be 
found  in  all  the  other  literatures  of  Europe  taken  to- 
gether ;  in  her  gospel  of  Romanticism,  in  her  drama  and 
lyric,  if  not  in  the  novel,  Germany  has  been  the  chief 
source  of  those  new  and  revolutionary  ideas  on  which 
France  ultimately  set  the  stamp  of  cosmopolitanism.  It 
is  true  that  the  literature  of  this  period  does  not  leave 
the  same  impression  of  greatness  as  that  of  the  eighteenth 
century ;  compared  with  the  large  number  of  interest- 
ing writers  of  minor  genius,  there  are  no  poets  who  stand 
out  solitary  and  pre-eminent  like  Lessing,  Goethe,  or 


286  GERMAN    LITERATURE    SINCE    1870. 

Schiller;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  there  is  not  that  enor- 
mous gulf  between  the  leaders  and  the  rank  and  file  which 
is  so  disappointing  a  feature  in  the  German  literature  of 
the  eighteenth  century.  Without  the  three  great  writers 
just  named,  German  classical  literature  sinks  back  into 
comparative  insignificance,  whereas  the  average  achieve- 
ment of  the  nineteenth  century  is  interesting  enough  to 
be  studied  even  in  writers  who  cannot  be  placed  in  the 
very  first  rank. 


CHRONOLOGICAL  TABLES. 


FROM  THE  FOURTH  CENTURY  TO  THE  END  OF  THE 
OLD  HIGH  GERMAN  PERIOD. 

J4j-  Wulfila  (311-383)  consecrated  Bishop  of  the  Visigoths.     Gothic 

Translation  of  the  Bible. 

ca.  3J75ica._45o.   Migrations  (Volkerwanderung). 
437.   Annihilation   of  the   Burgundians    by  the   Huns.     [449. 

Beginning  of  the  Germanic  Invasion  of  England.] 
456.  Attila's  death. 
475-526.   Theodorich  the  Great. 
480-750.   The  Merovingian  period. 
ca.    5°°-ca'   600.   The    Second    Sound-shifting  (Separation  of    High 

German  from  Low  German),     [ca.  650.  Beowulf.] 
ca.  68o-ca.  755.   Winfrith  (Bonifacius).     Old  High  German  Glosses. 

[ca.  700.  The  Lindisfarne  Gospels.    673-735.  Bede.     Caedmon. 

Cynewulf.j 
7j68J$i4.  Charles  the  Great  (Charlemagne).     735-804.  Alcuin. 

Translations  of  the  Liturgy.     Collection  of  Songs. 
ca.  780.   The  Wessobrunner  Gebet. 
ca.  jkxx   The  Hildebrandslied.      Monseer  Fragmente, 
814-840.   Ludwig  the   Pious. 
ca.  830.  The  Old  Saxon  Heliand  and  Genesis. 
ca.  835.   Translation  of  Tatian's  Gospel-Harmony.     Rabanus  Maurus 

in  Fulda. 
842.    Division  of  the  Carlovingian  Empire.     The  Strassburger 

Eide. 

843-876.   Ludwig  the  German.     [849-901.   King  Alfred.] 
ca.  850.   Muspilli. 

Between  863  and  871.  The  Evangelienbuch  of  Otfrid. 
88 1.   The  Ludwigslied. 


288 


CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES. 


919-1024.  The  Saxon  Emperors  (Heinrich   I..  Otto  I.,   Otto 

II.,  Otto  III.,    Heinrich  II.) 
ca.  930-   Ekkehard's  Waltharius. 
ca.  940.   Ecbasis  captivi. 

ca.  93<>ca.  1000.    Hrotsuith  of  Gandersheim. 
ca.  952-1022.   Xotker  of  St  Gall,     [ca.  955-ca.  1020.   Aelfric.] 
ca.  looo.   De  Heinrico. 
1024-39.    Konrad  II. 

ca.  1030.   Ruodlieb.     [ca.  1040.    Vie  de  Saint  Alexis.  ] 
1039-56.   Heinrich  III. 

MIDDLE  HIGH  GERMAN  PERIOD. 
Transition  from  Old  to  Middle  High,  German. 


ca.  ipjp-i  I 

1056-1106.    Heinrich  IV. 

ca.  1060.   Memento  rnori. 

1063.   The  Ezzolied.     Willeram,  Das  hohe  Lied.     [1066.  The  Battle 

of  Hastings.] 

ca.  1070.    Genesis.     Exodus.     Dreikonigsspiel. 
1076-85.   Heinrich's  conflict  with  Pope  Gregory  VII.  (Hilde- 

brand). 
ca.  1080.   The  Annolied.      [The   Chanson  de  Roland  and  the  earliest 

'chansons  de  gestes.  '] 
102^22,.   The  First  Crusade. 
1106-25.    Heinrich  V.      Hartmann's  Vom  Glauben.      Frau  Ava  (died 

1127). 

1125-37.  Lothar  the  Saxon. 

ca.  1130.   Lamprecht's  Alexanderlied.      Vorauer  Genesis. 
ca.  1135.    Konrad's  Rolandslied. 

1138-52.    Konrad  III.   (the  first  Hohenstaufen  emperor. 
ca.  1130-50.   The    Kaiserchronik.       [ca.    1079-1142.    Abelard.       ca. 

1100-54.    Geoffrey  of  Monmouth.] 
1147-49.  The  Second  Crusade. 

ca.  1150.    Isengrimus.     [ca.  1155.   Wace,  Roman  de  Brut.~\ 
1152-90.    Friedrich  I.  (Barbarossa). 
ca.  1160,   Kdiiisr  Rather.     Heinrich  von  Melk,  Von  des  t&des  gehugede 

and   Priesterleben.      [Wace's   Brut   (1155).     Benoit  de  Sainte 

More,   Roman  de  Troie."\ 
ca.  1  1  70.    Wernher,    Lieder  von   der  Jimgfrau.      Anegenge.      Floris 

und  Blanche/lur.       Heinrich    von    Veldeke,    Servatins.      [ca. 

1170-80.   Chretien  de  Troyes,    Yvain,  Perceval.] 
ca.  li6o-ca._jJ9O.   '  Springtime  of  the  Minnesang.'    Kurenberg,  Diet- 

mar  von    Aist,    the   Burggraf  von   Regensburg,    Meinloh   von 

Sevelingen,   Friedrich  von   Hausen  (died  1190),  Herger,  'Der 

Spervogel'). 


CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES.  289 

ca.  II7S-86.   Heinrich  von  Veldeke's  Emit.    ( 

ca.  1180.  Eilhart  von  Oberge,  Tristrant.  Herzog  Ernst.  Salman 
und  Morolf.  Orendel.  Oswald.  Wernher  von  Elmendorf, 
Tugendlehre.  Heinrich  der  Glichezare,  Reinhart.  [Maiie  de 
France,  Fables. ~\ 

1184.   Barbarossa's  Festival  at  Mainz. 

1 1 88.   Tegernsee  Antichrist  drama. 

1190-97.   Heinrich  VI.    1190-92.     The  Third  Crusade.     [1189-99. 

Richard  Cceur  de  Lion.]  -» 

ca.  1190-1200.   The  Nibelungenlied. 

ca.  1190.  Albrecht  von  Halberstadt,  Metamorphosen.  Walther  von 
der  Vogelweide's  earliest  lyrics.  Heinrich  von  Morungen. 
Reinmar  von  Hagenau  (died  ca.  1210). 

ca.  1191.   Hartmann  von  Aue,  Erec. 

ca.  1195.  Ulrich  von  Zatzikoven,  Lanzelet.  Herbert  von  Fritslar, 
Lied  von  Troja.  The  Lucidarius. 

ca.  1198.   Walther  leaves  Vienna,     [ca.  1137-ca.  1208.   Walter  Map.] 

1198-1208.  Philipp  of  Swabia.  1198-1215.  Otio  IV.  1198-1216. 
Pope  Innocent  III.  1200-4.  The  Fourth  Crusade. 

ca.  I2OO.    Hartmann's  Gregorius  ;  Der  arme  Heinrich. 

ca.  1205.  Hartmann's  hvein.  Wirnt  von  Gravenberg,  Wigalois. 
Der  IVinsbeke.  [Layamon's  Brut.  The  Ormuhtm.] 

ca.  1205-10.  Wolfram  von  Eschenbach,  Parzival. 

ca.  1210-15.  Gj^fned_y^n^S\iass^bji[g,  Tristan.  Wolfram's  Titnrcl 
and  Willehalm.  Gudnm.  [ca.  1205-13.  Villchardouin. 
Chronique.~\ 

1212.    Walther's  political  activity  on  behalf  of  Otto  IV. 

1215-50.  Friedrich  II.  1216-20.  The  Fifth  Crusade.  [1215. 
Magna  Charta  in  England.] 

I2l6.   Death  of  the  Landgraf  Hermann  of  Thuringia. 

ca.  1215.  Thomasin  von  Zirclsere,  Der  welsche  Cast.  [Robert  de 
Boron.  ] 

ca.  I22O.  Heinrich  von  Tiirlin,  Die  Krone.  Kor.rad  Fleck,  Flore 
und  Blanc hsjlttr.  '  Der  Strieker.'  Biterolf  und  Die tlieb.  Der 
Rosengarten.  Laurin.  [The  Ancren  Riwle.  Owl  and 
Nightingale.] 

ca.  1225.  Rudolf  von  Ems  (died  1254),  Der  gute  Gerhard,  Barlaam 
undjosaphat.  Eike  von  Repgdve,  Der  Sachsenspiegel, 

1227.    Walther  takes  Friedrich's  part  against  the  Pope, 
ca.  1225-40.   The    Later   Minnesang.      Neidhart    von    Reuental    (ca. 
Ii8o-ca.  1230).     Hiltbold  von  Schwangau  (ca.    1221-56).     Ul- 
rich von   Singenberg.      Leuthold    von    Sa'ben.      Reinmar    von 
Zweter  (ca.  1200-60).      Burkhart  von  Hohenfels.      Ulrich  von 
Winterstetten.     Gottfried  von  Neifen  (ca.  1234-55). 
T 


^ 


2QO  CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES. 

ca.  1217-30.   Freklank,  Bescheidenheit. 

ca.  1235.  Rudolf  von  Ems,  Wilhehn  von  Orlens.  [ca.  1237.  G.  de 
Lorris,  Roman  de  la  Rose.  Matthew  Paris.  ] 

ca.  1240.  Ulrich  von  Tiirheim.  Rudolf  von  Ems,  Weltchronik.  Rein- 
bot  von  Duren.  Der  heilige  Georg.  Wernher,  Meier  Heltn- 
brecht. 

1248-50.  The  Sixth  Crusade. 

ca.  1250.   Willem's  Reinaert  de  Vos.     [The  Harrouiitig  of  Hell.] 

1255.  Ulrich  von  Lichtenstein  (ca.  1200-76),  Frauendienst.  Bert- 
hold  von  Holle. 

1257-   Ulrich  von  Lichtenstein,  Das  Franenbuch. 

ca.  1260.  Konrad  von_  Wurzburg's  early  poems  (Alexius,  Der  Welt 
Lohn,  Die  goldene  Schmiede).  Religious  prose  :  David  von 
Augsburg  (died  1272),  Berthold  von  Regensburg  (ca.  1220-72). 
Der  Schivabenspiegel, 

1268.  Death  ofKonradin,  the  last  Hohenstaufen.  1270.  The 
Seventh  and  last  Crusade. 

ca.  1265-ca.  1275.  Konrad  von  Wurzburg's  Herzemdre  and  Engelhart. 
'  Der  Pleier.'  Der  jiingere  Titurel.  Alpharts  Tod.  '  Der 
Marner.'  Heinrich  von  Meissen  ('  Frauenlob  ')  (ca.  1250-1318). 
[Roger  Bacon.  Rutebeuf.  1265.  Dante  born.] 

1273-92.   Rudolf  of  Hapsburg. 

ca.  1277.  Konrad  von  Wurzburg's  Partenopier.  fj.  de  Meung,  con- 
tinuation of  the  Roman  de  la  Rose.] 

ca.  1280.  Lohengrin.  Konrad  von  Wiirzburg's  Trojanischer  Krieg. 
Ulrich  von  Eschenbach.  Dietrichs  Flitcht.  Die  Raben- 
schlacht. 

ca.  1285.   Seifried  Helbling.     [Havelok.    King  Horn.    Sir  Tristrem.] 

1287.   Konrad  von  Wurzburg's  death. 

ca.  1300.  Hugo  von  Trimberg,  Der  Renner.  Heinrich  von  Freiberg. 
Der  Warlburgkrieg.  Johannes  Hadlaub.  Heinzlein  von 
Konstanz,  Die  Minnelehre.  [Cursor  Mundi.] 

1327.   Death  of  Meister  Eckhart.     [1321.   Death  of  Dante.] 

ca.  1335.  Wisse  and  Colin,  Parzival.  [Petrarch  and  Laura.  Rolle 
of  Hampole.  L.  Minot.  Manning  of  Brunne.] 

ca.  1340.  Hadamar  von  Laber,  Die  Jagd.  [The  Tale  of  Gamely n. 
Michel's  Ayenbite  of  Inwyt.] 

TRANSITION  PERIOD 
(ca.  1350-1500). 

1348.  Founding  of  the  University  of  Prague. 

1349.  Ulrich    von   Boner,    Der  Edelstein.      [ca.    1350.      Boccaccio's 
Decameron,     Revival  of  alliterative  poetry  in  England.] 


CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES.  2QI 

1350-1550.   The  flourishing-period  of  the  German  Volkslied. 

ca.  1350.  Heinrich  Seuse  (ca.  1295-1366).  Johannes  Tauler  (ca. 
1300-61).  [Sir  Gawan  and  the  Grene  Knight.  1362  ff.  Piers 
Plowman,  ca.  1360-1400.  Froissart's  Chroniques.} 

ca.  1375.  West  Flemish  version  of  Reinke  l-'os.  Peter  Suchenwirt. 
[1374.  Petrarch  dies.  1376.  Barhour's  Bruce.'} 

1386-88.  Historical  ballads  on  the  Battle  of  Semper.  [1387-98. 
Chaucer's  Canterbury  Talcs.'] 

Beginning  of  I5th  Century.  Hugo  von  Montfort  (1357-1423).  Os- 
wald von  Wolkenstein  (ca.  1367-1445).  Heinrich  von  Witten- 
weiler,  Der  Ring.  [John  Lydgate.] 

ca.  1450.  The  Invention  of  Priming.   [1455-71.  Wars  of  the  Roses.] 

ca.  J45O-ca.  1460.  Hans  Rosenpliit  (ca.  1427-60).  Michael  Beheim 
(i4i6-ca.  1480).  Muskatblut.  Heinrich  von  Laufenberg 
(died  1460).  [Charles  d'Orleans  (ca.  1415-65).  F.  Villon.] 

1453.   Hermann  von  Sachsenheim,  Die  Mbhrin. 

1459-1519.  Maximilian  I.,  'the  last  of  the  knights.' 

1466.   The  first  German  Bible  printed  at  Strassburg. 

1470.  Wimpfeling's  Stylpho.     [ca.  1470.  Maitre  Patelin.~\ 

1472.  The  Dresdener  Heldenbuch.  Albrecht  von  Eyb.  [1475.  The 
Babees'  Book.} 

ca.  1475.   Der  Pfaffe  von  Kalenberg. 

ca.  1480.  Ulrich  Flietrer,  Buck  der  Abenteuer.  Theodor  Schernberg, 
Spiel  von  Fraufutten. 

1483.  Eulenspiegel.  Martin  Luther  born.  [Malory's  Morte  d1  Arthur, 
publ.  1485.] 

1494.  Sebastian  Brant,  Das  Narrenschiff.  Hans  Sachs  born.  [1492. 
Columbus  discovers  America.] 

1497.  Reuchlin's  Henno. 

1498.  Reinke  de  Vos.     [Lancelot  of  the  Lai k.} 


THE  SIXTEENTH  CKNTURY. 

ca.  1500.  Johann  Geiler  of  Kaisersberg  (1445-1510).     [Jean  Marot. 

John  Skelton.] 
1505.   Wimpfeling,   Deutsche   Geschichte.       1506.     Reuchlin,  Hebrew 

Grammar. 

1508.  Luther  goes  to  Wittenberg. 
1509-13.   Erasmus  in  England.      1509.   Erasmus,  Enchiridion  militis 

christiani,  Enconium  Mori<£.     [The  Ship  of  Fools.} 
ca.  1510.   Early  Niirnberg  Fastnachtsspiele  (Hans  Folz). 
1512.   Maximilian  I.,    Der    Weisskbnig.     Th.   Murner,  Die  Nan-en- 

beschwbrung.     [Gringoire,  Le  Jcu  du  Prince  dcs  Sots.} 


CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES. 

1515.  Eulenspiegel  printed  at  Strassburg.     1515-17.  Epislola  obscur- 
orum  virorum. 

1516.  Pamphilus    Gengenbach.    Die    Gouchmat.     [Arioslo's    Orlando 
Furioso.     More's   Utopia.     Skelton's  Magnificence.] 

'     1517.   Luther,   Thesen  wider  den  Ablass.      Maximilian  I.,  Teuerdank. 
Gengenbach,  Der  Nollhart.     Hans  Sachs's  earliest  Fastnachts- 
spiele. 
1519-55.  Charles  V.     [1509-47.    Henry  VIII.  in  England.] 

1519.  Th.  Mourner,  Die  (leuchmat.     [Skelton's  Colyn  Clout] 

1520.  Luther,  An  den  christlichen    Adel  deutscher  Nation,  De  cap- 
tivitate  babylonica  ecclesice,    Von  der  Freiheit    eines  Christen- 
menschen. 

1521.  Ulrich  Y9fl  Hutten.  Gesprdchbiichlein. 

1522.  Luther's  translation    of  the   New    Testament  published.      N. 
Manuel,    Vom  Papst  und  seiner  Priestschaft.      Th.    Murner, 
Der  grosse  lutherische  Narr.      J.    Pauli,  Schiinpf  tind  Ernst. 

1523.  Hans  Sachs,  Die  wittetnbergiscke  Nachtigall.     Hutten's  death. 

1524.  Luther's   Geistliche  Lieder.       Melanchthon.   Epitome  doctrines 
christiana;. 

1525.  The  Peasants' War.     N.  Manuel,  Der  Ablasskramer.     [Tin- 
dale's  Neiv  Testament] 

1527.  Burkard  Waldis,  Parabell  vani  vorlorn  Sohn. 

1528.  Luther's  hymn,  Eine  feste  Burg  ist  unser  Gott  in  the  Witten- 
berg   Gesangbuch.      N.    Manuel,    Von  der  Afesse   Krankheit. 
Death  of  Albrecht  Diirer.      [Castiglione,   //  Cortegiano.] 

1530.   Luther's  Fabeln. 

1532.  Sixt    Birck,    Susanna.      [1532-64.    Rabelais,    Garganlua    and 
Pantagruel.      1532.   Macchiavelli,  //  Principe  published  (writ- 
ten 1513).] 
»     1533.    Hans  Sachs's  first  Biblical  dramas.     [Death  of  Ariosto.] 

1534.  Luther's  Bible  completed.      Erasmus  Alberus,  Fabeln. 

1535.  P.  Rebhun,  Susanna.       [First  complete  English  Bible  (Cover- 
dale).] 

1538.  P.  Rebhun,  Die  Hochzeit  zu  Cana.     Naogeorgus,  Pammachius. 

1539.  J.  Wickram,  Ritter  Galmy  aus  Schottland. 

1540.  Naogeorgus,  Mercator. 

1542.   E.  Alberus,  Z>er  j9a?/w'j^r  ^/(»/r^  ^?</^w.9/?>^/ ?<wo?  ^/foraw. 
1545-63.   The  Council  of  Trent.      1544-45.   Cl.  Marot's  Psaumes. 
1546.   Luther's  death. 

1548.  Burkard    Waldis,    Esopus.       [ca.    1548.     Bale's    Kyng  Johan. 

1549-60.   La  Pleiade.] 

1549.  F.  Dedekind,  Grobianus.    [Joachim  du  Bellay,  Defense  et  Illus- 
tration de  la  langue  francaise.] 

1550.  E.  Alberus,  Buck  von  der  Tugend  tnid  Weisheit.    J.  Wickram, 


CHRONOLOGICAL   TABLES. 


293 


Tobias.       Hans   Sachs,    Der  fahrende  Sc  hitler    im    Paradies. 
Histori  Peter  Lewen.     fRonsard,    Odes.] 

1551.  K.  Scheidt,  Translation  of  Grobianus.     Hans  Sachs,  Das  heisse 
Risen. 

1552.  J.    Pauli,   Schimpf  und  Ernst.      Hans  Sachs,  Der  Bauer  im 
Fegefeuer.     Qodelle,    Cleopatre.     Grevin,    La  Mart  de  Cesar. 
1553.   Death  of  Rabelais.] 

1554.  J.  Wickram,  Der  jtmgen  Knaben  Spiegel.     [Bandello's  Novelle, 

I. -III.     Lazarillo  de  Tormes.~\ 
I555-  J-  Wickram,  Das  Rollwagenbilchlein. 
T556-  J-    Wickram,    Der  irrreitende    Pilger.     J.   Frey,    Garlengesell- 

schaft. 
1557-  J-  Wickram,  Der  Goldfaden.     M.   Montanus,  Der  Wegkilrzer. 

Hans  Sachs,  Der  hornen  Seifrit.     [Tottel's  Miscellany.'} 
1558-1603.  [Queen  Elizabeth  in  England.] 
1559.  M.  Lindener,  Das  Rastbuchlein.     Hans  Sachs,  Collected  Works, 

vol.  i.     [Margaret  of  Navarre,  Heptaineron  (1558-59).] 
X559-   V.    Schumann,    Das    Nachtbiichlein.     [A    Mirror  for  Magis- 
trates.     1561.   Scaliger's  Poetica.      Gorboditc.} 
1563.   H.    W.    Kirchhoff,    Wendumnut.      [1564.    Shakespeare  born. 

Galileo  born.] 
1566.   Luther's     Tischreden.       [Gascoigne's    Supposes    and    Jocasta. 

Bai'f,  Antigone.} 

1569.  G.    Buchanan's  Jephthes   performed    in   Strassburg.     [1568-80. 
R.  Gamier,   Tragedies.      1569-94.   Amadis  de  Ganla.  ] 

1570.  Fischart's  polemical  writings  on  behalf  of  protestantism.     [R. 
Ascham's  Scholemaster.\ 

I572-  Fischart,  A  Her  Praktik  Grossnnttter.  P.  Schede,  Translation 
of  Marot's  Psalms.  [Ronsard,  Franciade.  The  Massacre 
of  St  Bartholomew.] 

1573.   Fischart,  Flbh  Hatz,  Weiber  Tratz. 

1575.  Fischart,  Affenteurlich  naupengehetirlichc  Geschichtktitterung. 
Birth    of    Jakob     Bohme.       [Tasso's     Gemsalemme    liberata 
finished.] 

1576.  Fischart,    Das  glilckhafte  Schiff.      Frischlin,  Rebecca.      Hans 
Sachs  dies. 

1577.  Fischart,   Podagrammisch   7'rostbiichlein.     Frischlin,  Susanna. 

1578.  Fischart,    Ehezuchtbiichlein.     Frischlin,    Priscianus  vapulans. 
Joh.    Clajus,    Grammatice     Germanica;     lingtta:.      [J.    Lyly, 
Euphues.} 

1579.  Fischart,    Der    Bienenkorb.       Frischlin,    Hildegardis   inagtia ; 
Frau  Wendelgard.     [Du  Bartas,  La  premiere  Semaine.     Gos- 
son,  The  Schoole  of  Abuse.'} 

1580.  Fischart,     Das     fesuiterhiitlein.       Frischlin,     Phaswa.      [Sid- 


2Q4  CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES. 

ney's  Arcadia  begun.  Montaigne's  Essais.  Death  of 
Camoens.  ] 

1584.  Frischlin,  Julius  Ccesar  Redivivus. 

1585.  B.  Ringwaldt,  Die  lauter  Wahrheit.     [Death  of  Ronsard.] 

1587.  Historia  -von  D.  Johann  Fausten.     [Brant6me.     Execution 
of  Mary  Stuart.] 

1588.  B.    Ringwaldt,  Der  treue  Eckart.      [Th.    Kyd,    The  Spanish 

Tragedy.  Marlowe,  Dr  Faustus.  1590.  Spenser,  The  Faery 
Queene,  I. -III.] 

ca.  1586-03.  1666.   '  Englische  Komodianten  '  in  Germany. 

1593-94.  Duke  Heinrich  Julius  of  Brunswick's  dramas.  [Shake- 
speare's beginnings.  1594-  La  Satire  Menippee.~\ 

1595.  G.  Rollenhagen,  Die  Froschmduseler.  [Daniel,  The  Civil 
Wars.  Spenser,  The  Faery  Queene,  IV. -VI.  Tasso's  death.] 

1598.  Martin  Opitz  born.    [Bacon's  Essays.    Chapman's  Iliad.    The 
Edict  of  Nantes.] 

1599.  G.  R.  Widmann's  Faustbuch.    [Death  of  Spenser.     Erection  of 
Globe  Theatre.     Ben  Jonson,  Every  man  out  of  his  Humour. 
1600.   Shakespeare's  Midsummer- Nighfs  Dream,  Merchant  of 
Venice,  Much  Ado  about  Nothing,  Henry  V.~\ 


THE  SEVENTEENTH  CENTURY. 

Beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century.  [Shakespeare's  greatest  dramas. 
Ben  Jonson.  Beaumont  and  Fletcher.  Bacon's  Advancement 
of  Learning  (1605),  Cervantes's  Don  Quixote  (1605-15).  Birth 
of  Corneille  (1606).  Birth  of  Milton  (1608).] 

1612.  J.  Bohme,  Aurora,  oder  Morgenrote  im  Aufgang.  [The  Vocabu- 
lario  of  the  Accademia  della  Crusca.  D'Urfe's  L'Astree 
(1610-19).] 

1616.  Andreas  Gryphius  born.  [Death  of  Shakespeare  and  Cer- 
vantes.] 

*    1617.   M^L  Pp'ty-   Aristarchus.       Founding  of  the  '  Fruchtbringende 
Gesellschaft.' 

1618-48.  The  Thirty  Years'  War. 

1618.  G.  Weckherlin,  Oden  und  Gesange.  J.  Ayrer,  Opus  Theatricum. 
'^,1619-20.   Opitz  in  Heidelberg. 

1620.  Englische  Konwdien  uiid  Tragb'dien.  Opitz  in  Holland. 
[Bacon's  Novum  Organum.  1621.  Burton's  Anatomy  of 
Melancholy.  Barclay's  Argents.  1622.  Birth  of  Molifere.] 

1624.  Opitz,  Teutsche  Poemata  (edited  by  J.  W.  Zincgref).  Opitz, 
Bitch  von  der  deulschen  Poeterei. 


CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES.  295 

1626.  Opitz's  translation  of  Barclay's  Argents.     1625.   Don  Quixote 
partially  translated  into  German. 

1627.  Opitz;s  translation  of  Rinuccini's  Dafne  (first  Italian  opera  in 
Germany).     1629.   Opitz's  translation  of  Sidney's  Arcadia. 

1630.  Liebeskampf,  oder  mveiter  Teil  der  englischtn  Komodien   und 

Tragodien.     Opitz,  Hercine. 
1633.  Opitz's  Trostgedichte  in  Widerwdrtigkeit  des  Krieges.     [1632. 

Prynne's  Histriomastix.     1634.   Milton's  Comus.] 
1638.   Logan's  Erstes  ffundert  teutscher  Reimspriiche.     [1636.   Cor- 

neille's  Le  Cid.] 

1639-   Opitz's  death.     Simon  Dach  professor  in  Kdnigsberg. 
1640-1688.   Friedrich  Wilhelm,  der  Grosse  Kurfurst. 
ca.  1640.   H.    M.    Moscherosch,    Gesichte  Philanders  -uon  Sittewald. 

1640.   Death  of  Fleming.      [1642.   Closing  of  the  theatres  in 

England.      1642-43.  Corneille,  Horace,  Cinna.] 

1643.  Ph.  Zesen's  '  Teutschgesinnte  Genossenschaft.'    J.  Balde,  Cay- 
mina  lyrica. 

1644.  'Der  gekronte  Blumenorden'  ('Pegnitzschafer')  founded.    [Cor- 
neille, Le  Mentettr.     Milton,  Areopagitica.] 

1645.  Ph.  Zesen,  Die  adriatische  Rosemund. 

1646.  P.  Fleming,  Teutsche  Poemata  published.      Leibniz  born. 
1647-53.    G.  P.  Harsdorffer,  Der  poetische   Trichter,     [1647.   Rotrou, 

Venceslas.  ] 

1648.  The  Peace  of  Westphalia.      P.  Gerhardt,  earliest  hymns. 

1649.  F.    von    Spec,    Trutznachtigall.      [Mile,   de   Scudery,    Cyrus. 

1649-59.   The  Commonwealth  in  England.] 

1650.  A.  Gryphius,  Leo  Armenius  (written  1646). 

1652.  J.      Lauremberg,     Scherzgedichte.       [1651.     Scarron,    Roman 

comique.      Hobbes,   Leviathan.  ] 
1654.  F.  von  Logau,  Deutsche  Sinngedichte.     [Vondel,  Lucifer.'} 

1656.  J.     B.     Schupp,     Katechismuspredigt.       [Mile,    de     Scudery, 

CUlie.] 

1657.  Angelus    Silesius,    Heilige    Seelenlust   and    Der  cherubinischc 

Wanders  matin  (2nd  edition,  1674).  A.  Gryphius,  Katharina 
von  Georgien,  Cardenio  und  Celinde,  Carolus  Sluardits  (written 
1649).  [D'Aubigne,  Le  Pratique  du  Theatre.] 

1658.  J.  Rist's  'Elbschwanenorden.' 

1659-60.   A.  H.  Bucholtz,  Herkules  und  Valiska.     The  novels  of  E. 
W.  Happel.     [1659.    Moliere,  Les  precieuses  ridicules.] 

1660.  A.   Gryphius,  Die  Dornrose  performed.     [The  Restoration 
in  England.     Dryden,  Astrcza  redux.} 

1661.  D.   K.  von  Lohenstein,  Cleopatra.     1662.   Moliere,  Vecole  des 
f em  mes. 

1663.   A.  Gryphius,  Peter  Squenh  and  Hornbilicribrijax(\>o\\\  written 


2g6 


CHRONOLOGICAL   TABLES. 


1647-50).     Schottelius,  Die  deutsche  Hauptsprache.     [1663-78. 
S.  Butler,  Hudibras.'} 

1664.  J.  Rachel,  Satirische  Gedichte.     Death  of  Gryphius. 

1665.  Lohenstein,    Agrippina.     [Larochefoucauld,    Maximes.     1606. 
Moliere,   Le  Misanthrope.       Furetiere,  Le  Roman  bourgeois. 
Dryden,  Essay  of  Dramatic  Poesie.] 

1667.  P.      Gerhardt,     Geistliche     Andachten.       [Milton's    Paradise 
Lost.  ] 

1668.  C,.  Weise.  Uberjlilssige  Gedanken  der  griinenden  Jugend. 

1669.  J.  J.  C.   von  Grimmelshausen,  SimpHcissimus ;  Die  Landstbr- 
zerin  Courasche.      Anton  Ulrich  of  Brunswick,  Aramena  (1669- 
73).     [Dryden,  The  Conquest  of  Granada.     Moliere,  Le  Tar- 
tuffe.     Racine,  Britannicus.~\ 

1670.  Schaubiihne    der  englischen   und  franzbsischen   Kombdianten. 
Grimmelshausen,     Der     selfsame     Springinsfeld.        [Pascal, 
Pensees.  ] 

1672.  C.  Weise,  Die  drei  drgsten  Erznarren.     Grimmelshausen,  Das 
wunderbarliche  Vogelnest.     [Moliere,  Les  femmes  savantes.] 

1673.  C.    Weise,    Die   drei  klugsten   Leute.      [W.    Wycherley,    The 

Country    Wife.      1674.   Boileau,    L'Art  poetique.      Death   of 

Milton.] 
1675.   Ph.    Spener,    Desideria   pia.      [1676.    Dryden,    Aureng-Zebe. 

Otway,  Don  Carlos.     Wycherley,   The  Plaindealer.~\ 
ca.  i675-ca.  1700.   Pietistic  religious  poets  :  Ph.  Spener,  J.  Neander, 

G.  Tersteegen,  N.  L.  von  Zinzendorf. 

1677.  Anton  Ulrich  of  Brunswick,  Die  rbmische  Oktavia.     [Racine's 
Phedre.     N.  Lee,  The  Rival  Queens.] 

1678.  C.  Weise,  rector  in  Zittau.      Hofmannswaldau's  translation  of 
Guarini's  Pastor  Jido.      1678-1738.    German  opera  in  Hamburg. 
[1678.   Lafontaine's  Fables.     Dryden,  All  for  Love.      1678-84. 
Bunyan,    The  Pilgrim's  Progress.] 

1679.  C.  Weise,  Der  bdurische  Machiavell.    J.  Neander,  Btindeslieder 
und  Dankpsalmen.      Ph.    von   Zesen,    Simson.      [Th.    Otway, 
The  Orphan.} 

1680.  Hofmannsvvaldau,     Heldenbriefe.       D.      K.     von     Lohenstein, 
Sophonisba.     Abraham  a  Santa  Clara,  Merk's  Wien  !  and  Atif, 
auf,  ihr  Christen  !      [Dryden,   Absalom  and  Achitophel.     N. 
Lee,  Theodosius.~\ 

1682.  The  Acta  Eruditorum  begin  to  appear  at  Leipzig.  C.  Weise, 
Masaniello.  [Bunyan,  The  Holy  War.  Th.  Otway,  Venice 
Preserved.  ] 

1686.  Abraham  a  Santa  Clara,  Judas  der  Erzschelm.  [Dryden,  The 
Hind  and  the  Panther.  ] 

1687-88.   Ch.    Thomasius    lectures    in    German  at    the    University  of 


CHRONOLOGICAL   TABLES.  297 

Leipzig.       1688-89.      Thomasius,    Scherz-    und  ernsthafte  Gc- 

danken. 
1688.   A.  von  Ziegler,  Die  asiatische  Banise.     [La   Bruyere,    Carac- 

teres.     1688-97.    Perrault,  Paraltiles.} 
1689-90.   Lohenstein,    Arminius    und    Tkusnelda.       [1689.     Racine, 

Esther.        1691.     Athalie.      1690.     Dryden,    Don    Sebastian. 

J.    Locke,  Essay  concerning  Human   Understanding.} 
1692.  A.   Francke  in  Halle.      [1698.  Congreve,    The  Old  Bachelor, 

The  Dottble  Dealer.} 

1694.  Founding  of  the  University  of  Halle. 

1695.  B.  Neukirch,  Herrn  von  Hofmannswaldau  und  anderer  Dent 
schen  auserlesene  Gedichte. 

1696.  C.  Reuter,  Schelmuffsky.     [Regnard,  Le  Joiieur.} 

1697.  C.    Wernigke,   Epigrammata.      Leibniz,     Unvorgreifliche   Ge- 
danken.      [Bayle,   Dictionnaire.       J.  Vanbrugh,    The  Relapse. 
1699.   Fenelon,   Telhnaque.} 

THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY.  '   &* 


1700.  Founding  of  the  Berlin  Academy.  R.  von  Canitz,  Nebensttm- 
den  unterschiedener  Gedichte.  [Death  of  Dryden.  Congreve, 
The  Way  of  the  World.} 

1701-13.  Friedrich  I.  of  Prussia.  1705-11.  Joseph  I.  of 
Austria.  [1697-1718.  Charles  XII.  of  Sweden.  1701- 
13.  War  of  the  Spanish  Succession.  1702-14.  Queen 
Anne.] 

1705.  C.  Weise,  Komodie  von  der  bosen  Katliarina.  [1704.  Swift, 
The  Tale  of  a  7u&.  I.  Newton,  Optics.  1707.  Le  Sage,  Le 
Diable  boiteux.  G.  Farquhar,  The  Beaux'  Stratagem.} 

1710.  Leibniz,  Essais  de  Theodicce.     [1709-11.    The  Tatler.    1711-15. 

The  Spectator.     1711.    Pope,  Essay  on  Criticism.      1712.  J.  J. 
Rousseau  born.] 

1711.  J.  von  Besser,  Schriften. 

1713.   Der    Verniinftler    (Hamburg).       [The    Guardian.       Addison, 

Cato.} 
1713-40.    Friedrich  Wilhelm  of  Prussia.     [1714-27.   George  I. 

in  England.] 
1715.   B.    H.    Brockes,    Bethlemitischer  Kindennord.     [1715-35.  Le 

Sage,   Gil  Bias.} 

1719.  Death   of  Leibniz.     [1718.    Voltaire,    Oedipc.      1719.     Dubos, 
Reflexions  sur  la  poesie  et  la  peinture.    Defoe,  Robinson  Crusoe.} 

1720.  Ch.   Wolff,   Verniinftige  Gedanken  von  Gott,  der  Welt  und  der 
Seele  des  Menschen. 

1721.  Bodmerand  Breitinger,  Diskurse  der  Maler  (1721-23).   Brockes, 


2Q8  CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES. 

Irdisches  Vergniigen  in  Gott  (vol.   ix.,  1748).     [Montesquieu, 

Lettres  per  sane  s.  } 
1724.  J.  C.  Giinther,  Gedichte.     Gottsched  comes  to  Leipzig.      Klop- 

stock  and  Kant  born.    1724-26.  Der  Patriot.    [1723.  Voltaire, 

Henriade.     1723-25.   L.  Holberg's  comedies.] 
1725-27.   Gottsched,  Die  verniinftigen   Tadlerinnen  and  Der  Bieder- 

mann.     1725.   [G.   B.   Vico,  La  nuova  scienza.      1726.   Swift, 

Gulliver  s  Travels.    1726-30.  J.  Thomson,  The  Seasons.    1728. 

Pope,  The  Dunciad.  ] 

1729.  F.  von  Hagedorn,  Versuch  einiger  Gedichte.     Lessing  born. 

1730.  Gottsched,  Kritische  Dichtkunst.     [Voltaire,  Brutus.} 
I73I-43«  J-  G.  Sclmabel,  Die  Insel  Felsenburg.    [1731,  G.  Lillo,  The 

Merchant  of  London.     1731-41.   Marivaux,  Marianne.} 
1732.   A.    von    Haller,    Versuch   sehiveizerischer  Gedichte.     Bodmer, 

translation  of  Paradise  Lost.     Gottsched,  Der  sterbende  Cato. 

[Voltaire,  Z,a'ire.     Destouches,  Le  Glorieux.} 
1732-44.   Gottsched,  Beitrdge  zur  kritischen  Historic.     1733.   Wieland 

born. 

1734.  Haller,  Die  A/pen.     [Voltaire,  Lettres  anglaises.} 
1735-40.  A.    G.     Haumgarten   in     Halle.       [1735.    Prevost,    Manoti 

Lescaut.  } 

1738.    Hagedorn,  Fabeln  und  Erzdhhmgen. 
!739-  C.    L.    Liscow,    Satirische    und    ernsthafte    Schriften.       [D. 

Hume,    Treatise  on  Human  Nature.} 
1740-86.    Frederick     the     Great.       1740-80.     Maria     Theresa. 

[1727-60.   George  II.   in  England.] 

1740.  Conflict  between  Gottsched  and  Bodmer  and  Breitinger.     Brei- 
tinger,  Kritische  Dichtkunst  and  Kritische  Abhandlungvonden 
Gleichnissen.     Bodmer,  Kritische  Abhandlung  von  dem  Wun- 
derbaren.     1740-45.   Gottsched,  Deutsche  Schaubuhne.     [1740. 
Richardson,  Pamela.} 

1741.  K.  W.  von  Borck,  translation  of  Shakespeare's  Julius  Cicsar, 

[G.    F.    Handel,     The    Messiah.       Nivelle    de    la    Chaussee, 
Me/anide. } 

1742.  Hngedorn,  Oden  und  Lieder.     [Fielding,  Joseph  Andrews.} 

1743.  !•  E.  Schlegel,  Hermann.     [Young,  Night  Thoughts} 

1744.  F.     W.    Zacharia,    Der  Renonunist.     1744-45.  J-    ^    Gleim, 
Scherzhafte  Lieder.     Herder  born.      1744-48.  Bremer  Beilrdge. 
[1744.  Death  of  Pope.  ] 

1745.  Pyra  and  Lange,  Freundschaftluhe  Lieder  (written  1737).  [Vol- 
taire, Merope.      Laplace,  Le  the&tre  anglais.      1745-48.] 

1746-48.  Lessing  in  Leipzig.    C.  F.  Gellert,  Fabeln  und  Erzahlungen. 
1747.  J.    E.    Schlegel,     Canut ;    Die    stumme    Schonheit.       1747-48- 
Gellert,   Die  schivedischc  Grtifin.     [Voltaire,   Zadig} 


CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES.  2QQ 

1748.  Gottsched,  Deutsche  Sprachkunst.  J.  E.  Schlegel,  Dei-  Triumph 
der  gutett  Frauen.     Klopstock,  Der  Messias,  i.-iii.      Lessing, 
Derjimge  Gelehrte.    [Richardson,  Clarissa  Harlotve.    Smollett, 
Roderick  Random.     Montesquieu,  Esprit  des  Lois. ] 

1 74^-55-   Lessing  in  Berlin.     1750-52.  Voltaire  in  Berlin. 

1749.  Ch.  E.  von  Kleist,  Der  Fruhling.     J.  P.  Uz,  Lyrische  Gedichtc. 
Goethe  born.     [Fielding,    Tom  /ones.     Voltaire,  JVanme,] 

1750.  A.  G.  Baumgarten,  Aesthetica(l'j$Q-$'S>).    Hagedorn,  Aloralischc 

Gedichte.  Bodmer,  Noah.  Klopstock  in  Zurich.  Lessing, 
Beitrdge  zur  Historic  und  Aufnahme  des  l^heaters.  [Young, 
Conjectures  on  Original  Composition.  Th.  Gray,  Elegy  in 
a  Country  Churchyard.] 

1751.  Klopstock,  Der  Messias  (vol.  i.).     Lessing,  Kleinigkeiten.    [Vol- 
taire, Le  Siecle  de  Louis  XIV.     Smollett,  Peregrine  Pickle.} 

1751-55.  G.  W.  Rabener,  Sammlung  safirischer  Schriften.  1751-69. 
Gellert  professor  in  Leipzig.  [1751-80.  L' Encyclopedic.] 

1752.  Wieland  in  Zurich  ;  Die  Natur  der  Dinge.     C.  F.  Weisse,  Der 

Teufel  ist  los  ! 

1753-54.  Lessing,  Rettiingen.  [1753.  Richardson,  Sir  Charles  Grandi- 
son.  E.  Moore,  The  Gamester.  1753-58.  Voltaire,  Essai  sur 
les  mceurs.] 

1754.  S.  Gessner,  Daphnis.     1754-58.    Lessing,  Theatralische  Biblio- 
thek.     [1754-76.  L'Annee  h'tteraire.] 

1755.  Lessing,  Miss  Sara  Sampson.     Uz,    Theodicee.      Winkelmann, 
Gedanken    uber    die    Nachahmung    der   griechischen     Werke. 
A.  G.  Kastner,    Vermischte  Schriften.     [Johnson,   Dictionary. .] 

I756-63-   The  Seven  Years'  War.      1755-58.   Lessing  in  Leipzig. 

1756.  Gessner,    Idyllen.     Klopstock,  Der  Messias,  vol.  ii.     Zimmer- 
mann,   Betrachtungen  uber  die  Einsamkeit. 

1757.  Gellert,    Geistliche    Oden    und   Lieder.     Klopstock,  Der   Tod 
Adams.     Gottsched,   Notiger   Vorrat,   vol.    i.    (vol.  ii..    1765). 
[Diderot,  Le  fils  nature!.'] 

1758.  Gleim,   Preussische  Kriegslieder  von  einem-  Grenadier.     Klop- 
stock, Geistliche  Lieder.     Gessner,  Der  Tod  Abels.     Wieland, 
Lady  Johanna   Gray.    J.  F.  von  Cronegk,  Codrus.    J.  W.  von 
Brawe,  Der  Freigeist.     [Voltaire,  Candide.     Diderot,  Le  perc 
de  famille.] 

1758-65.  Lessing,  Literaturbriefe. 

1759.  Lessing,     Philotas ;     Fabeln.      C.    F.     Weisse,     Richard    III. 
Hamann,     Sokratische     Denkwurdigkeiten.        Kleist's    death. 
Schiller    born.       [Burns    born.       I759-6?-    Sterne,     Tristram 
Shandy.  ] 

1760.  Wieland    becomes    Kanzleidirektor    in     Biberach.        1760-65. 
Lessing  in  Breslau. 


300  CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES. 

1761.  Th.  Abbt,  Vom   Tod  furs   Vaterland,     Wieland,  Araspes  una 

Panthea.     [Rousseau,  La  nouvelle  Heloise.~\ 
1762-66.  Wieland,  translation  of  Shakespeare.     1762.  Gluck,  Orfeo. 

[Rousseau,  Entile,  Le  Contrat  social.     Macpherson,   Ossian.} 

1763.  A.  L.  Karschin,  Auserlesene  Gedichte. 

1764.  Klopstock,    Salomo.      Wieland,    Don    Sylvia    von     Rosalva. 
Winkelmann,   Geschichte  der   Kunst   des   Altertums.     Ossian 
translated.     M.  von  Thummel.   Wilhelmine.     [Voltaire,  Dic- 
tionnaire  philosophique.~\ 

1765-68.  Goethe  in  Leipzig.   1765.  Th.  Abbt,  Vom  Verdienste.  [Percy, 
Reliques  of  English  Poetry, .] 

1766.  Lessing,  Laokoon.     1766-67.   Wieland,  Agathon.     H.   W.  von 
Gerstenberg,   Gedicht  eines   Skalden ;   Briefe   iiber  die  Merk- 
wiirdigkeiten     der    Literatur    (1766-70).       [Goldsmith,      The 
Vicar  of  Wakefield.~\ 

1767.  Lessing,   Minna  von  Barnhelm,    Hamburgische  Dramaturgic 
(1767-69).       Mendelssohn,    Phddon.         Herder,    Fragmente. 
[Beaumarchais,   Eugenie.} 

1768.  Wieland,  Musarion  ;  Idris  und  Zenic/e.     Gerstenberg,  Ugolino. 
Goethe,     Die    Laune  des     Verliebten.       [Sterne,    Sentimental 
Journey.  ] 

1769.  Klopstock,  Der  Messias,  vol.  iii. ;  Hermannsschlacht.     Herder's 
voyage  to  France.     C.  II.  von  Ayrenhoff,  Der  Postzug. 

1770.  Lessing  becomes  librarian  in  Wolfenbiittel.     1770-71.   Herder 
and  Goethe  in  Strassburg.     Hegel  born. 

1771.  Klopstock,  Oden  (first  collected  edition).    1771-75.  M.Claudius, 
Der  Wandsbecker  Bate. 

1772.  Klopstock,   David.      Ramler,  Lyrische   Gedichte.      M.    Denis, 
Lieder  Sineds  des   Barden.      Lessing,   Emilia    Galotti.      Wie- 
land, Der  goldene  Spiegel.     Goethe  in  Wetzlar.     Founding  of 
the  '  Gottinger  Hain.' 

1773.  Klopstock,  Der  Messias,  vol.  iv.  (and  last).     Von  deutscher  Art 
und  Kunst.     Goethe,  Gotz  von  Berlichingen.     G.  A.  Burger, 
Lenore.     C.  F.  Nicolai,  Sebaldus  Not  hanker. 

1773-89.  Wieland,    Der    Teutsche    Merkur.       1773-81.     Schiller    as 
'  Karlsschliler.' 

1774.  Klopstock,  Deutsche  Gelehrtenrepublik.    Lessing,  Wolfenbiittler 
Fragmente   (1774-78).       Wieland,    Die   Abderiten.        Goethe. 
Werthers  Leiden ;  Clavigo.     J.  M.  R.   Lenz,  Der  Hofmeister. 
J.  Moser,  Patriotische  Phantasien. 

1775.  Goethe  goes  to  Weimar.     Nicolai,  Freuden  des  jungen    Wer- 
thers.    F.   M.    von   Klinger,   Otto.      1775-78.    J.   K.   Lavater, 
Physiognomische  Fragmente.      [Beaumarchais,   Le  Barbier  de 
Seville.     Sheridan,    The  Rivals.'} 


CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES.  301 

1776.  Wieland,  Gandalin.  G.  C.  Lichtenberg,  Brief e  aus  England 
(1776-78).  Herder  called  to  Weimar.  Goethe,  Stella.  Klinger, 
Die  Zwillinge;  Sturm  und  Drang.  Leisewitz,  Julius  von 
Tarent.  H.  L.  Wagner,  Die  Kindermorderin.  Maler  Muller, 
Faust  ( 1 776-78).  J.  M.  Miller,  Siegwart.  Shakespeare's  Hamlet 
in  Hamburg.  The  Hofburgtheater  in  Vienna.  [Adam  Smith, 
The  Wealth  of  Nations.'} 

1777-  WK\&n&tGeronderAdlige.  H.  Jung-Stilling,  Jugend.  1777-79. 
F.  H.  Jacobi,  Woldemar.  [Sheridan,  The  School  for  Scandal.  ] 

1778.  Lessing,  Anti-Goeze ;  Ernst  und Falk.  Biirger,  Gedichte  (Der 
wildejdger).  Hippel,  Lebensldufe  (1778-81).  [Death  of  Vol- 
taire and  Rousseau.] 

1779-  Lessing,  Nathan  der  Weise.  The  brothers  Stolberg.  Gedichte. 
Gluck,  Iphigenie  en  Tauride.  The  National  theater  in  Mann- 
heim opened. 

1780.  Lessing,   Die  Erziehung  des   Menschengeschlechts.      Wieland, 
Oberon.      Frederick  the  Great,  De   la  literature  allemande. 
O.    von   Gemmingen,    Der  deutsche  Hattsvater.     J.    A.    von 
Torring,  Agnes  Bernauerin. 

1781.  Death  of  Lessing.      Kant,  Kritik  der  reinen  Vernunft.     J.  H. 
Voss,  translation  of  the  Odyssey.     Schiller,  Die  Raitber. 

1782.  Schiller's   flight   from  Stuttgart.      1782-83.  L.    H.   C.    Holty, 

Gedichte. 

1782-86.  J.  K.  A.  Musaus,  Volksmdrchen.     [1782-88.   Gibbon, 

The  Decline  and  Fall  of  the  Roman  Empire.'} 

1783.  Schiller,  Fiesco.     Jean  Paul's  literary  beginnings. 

1784.  Klopstock,  Hermann  und  die  Ftirsten.       K.  A.  Kortum.y^- 
siade.      Voss,  Luise.     Schiller,  Kabale  und  Liebe.       1784-91. 
Herder,  Ideen  sur  Philosophic  der  Geschichte  der  Menschheit. 
[Beaumarchais,  Le  Mariage  de  Figaro.'} 

1785.  Voss,  Idyllen  (first  collected  edition).     K.   Ph.   Moritz,  Anton 
Reiser.     Schiller  in  Leipzig,  An  die  Freude.      A.  W.  Iffland, 
Die  Jdger. 

1786.  Death  of  Frederick  the  Great.     1786-88.  Goethe's  Italian 
Tourney. 

1787.  Klopstock,  Hermanns  Tod.     Schiller,  Don  Carlos.  J.  J.  Heinse, 
Ardinghello.     Goethe,  Iphigenie  auf  7'auris.     F.  von  Matthis- 
son,  Gedichte.     [St  Pierre,  Paul et  Virginie.} 

1788.  A.  Knigge,  Uber  den  Umgangmit  Menschen.   Goethe,  Egm ont. 
Schiller,  Abfall  der  Niederlande.     Kant,  Kritik  der praktischen 
Vernunft.     A.  Schopenhauer  born. 

1789.  The   Beginnings  of  the   French    Revolution.     Schiller 
professor  in  Jena.    Schiller,  Der  Geisterseher ;  Die  Kiinstler. 
Kojtzebue,  Jtfenschenhass  und  Reue. 


302  CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES. 

1790.  Goethe,    Faust,   ein    Fragment;    Tasso.      Kant,    Kritik   der 

Urteilskraft. 

1791.  Schiller,    Geschichte   des  dreissigjdhrigen   Krieges   (1791-93). 
J.  G.  Forster,  Ansichlen  vom  Niederrhein.     Klinger,  Medea ; 
novels  (1791-98).     Mozart,  Die  Zauberflble.     Grillparzer  born. 
Goethe  takes  over  the  direction  of  the  Weimar  theatre  (1791- 
1817).     [Volney,  Les  Ritines.~\ 

1793.  Schiller,  Uber  An/nut  tind  Wiirde.     Richter,  Die  tinsichtbare 
Loge.    J.  G.  von  Salis-Seewis,  Gedichte,     Goethe,  Der  Burger- 
general. 

1794.  The  friendship  of  Goethe  and  Schiller  (1794-1805).     Goethe, 
Reineke  Fucks.    H.  Zschokke,  Abdllino.   Fichte,  Wissenschafts- 
lehre. 

1795.  Goethe,  Romische  Elegien  ;   Wilhelm  Meisters  Lehrjahre  (1795- 
96).     Schiller,  Die  Horen  (1795-97);  Musenalmanach  (1796- 
99) ;  Briefe   iiber    die    dsthetische   Erziehung   des   Menschen ; 
tJber  naive  und  sentimentalische  Dichtung  (1795-96).     J.  P.  F. 
Richter,   Hesperus.     J.  L.    Tieck,    William   Lovell  (1795-97). 
M.  G.   Lewis,    The  Monk.} 

1796.  Goethe    and    Schiller,    Xenien.      Richter,    Quintus  Fixlein  ; 
Siebenkds  (1796-97).      [Coleridge,   Poems. ~\ 

1797.  Goethe,  Hermann  und  Dorothea.    Goethe  and  Schiller,  Ballads 
{Balladenalmanach,    1798).       Tieck,    Der    gestiefelte    Kater. 
Wackenroder  and  Tieck,  Herzensergiessungen.      F.  Holderlin, 
Hyperion  (1797-99).   A.  W.  Schlegel,  translation  of  Shakespeare 
(1797-1801,  1810).     F.  Schlegel,  Die  Griechen  und  Romer. 

1798.  Goethe,   Die  Propylden   (1798-1800).     Schiller,    Wallensteins 
Lager.     Das  Athendum  (1798-1800).    Tieck  and  Wackenroder, 
Franz  Stembald.     F.  W.  J.  von  Schelling,   Von  der  Weltseele. 
[Coleridge  and  Wordsworth  in  Germany,  Lyrical  Ballads.] 

1799-  Schiller,  Die  Piccolomini ;  Wallensteins  Tod ;  Das  Lied  von 
der  Glocke.  W.  von  Humboldt,  Asthetische  Versuche.  Tieck, 
Romantische  Dichtungen  (1799-1800).  F.  Schlegel,  Lucinde. 
Schleiermacher,  Reden  iiber  die  Religion.  Schiller  settles  in 
Weimar. 

1800.  Wieland,  Aristipp  (1800-2).     Schiller,  Maria  Stuart,     Richter, 

Titan  (1800-3).  Novalis,  Hymnen  an  die  Nacht.  Schleier- 
macher, Monologen.  [Scott's  translation  of  Goethe's  G'dtz  von 
Berlichingen.  ] 

THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. 

1801.  Schiller,  Die  fungfrau  von  Orleans.     C.   A.   Tiedge,  Urania. 
C.    M.    Brentano,  Godwi.      Death  of  Novalis.      Hegel  in  Jena 
(1801-6).     H.  J.  von  Collin,  Regulus.     [Chateaubriand,  Atala.'} 


CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES.  303 

1802.  F.    Schlegel,    Alarkos.      Novalis,    Heinrich    von    Ofterdingen. 
L.  A.  von  Arnim,  Hollins  Liebeleben.     [Chateaubriand,   Genie 
du  Christianisme.  ] 

1803.  Schiller,  Die   Braut  von  Messina.      Goethe,    Die   natiirliche 

Tochter.  Death  of  Klopstock  and  Herder.  J.  G.  Seume, 
Spaziergang  nach  Syrakuse.  J.  P.  Hebe],  Alemannische 
Gedichte.  Z.  Werner,  Die  Sbhnc  dcs  Thalcs  (1803).  II.  von 
Kleist,  Die  Famille  Schroffenstcin. 

1804.  Schiller,  Wilhelm  Tell.     Richter,  Flcgeljahrc  (1804-5).    Tieck, 
Kaiser  Oktavianus.     A.  W.    Schlegel  joins  Madame  de  Slael. 
Tieck  goes  to  Rome.  Der  grime  Almanack  (1804-6).  [Chateau- 
briand, Rene.} 

1805.  Schiller's   death.       Herder,  Der  Cid.     Goethe,    Winkelmanu. 
Brentano  and  Arnim   in  Heidelberg.     DCS  Knaben   Wunder- 
horn,  vol.  i.      Beethoven,  Fidelia. 

1806.  The   I'.attle  of  Jena.    E.  M.  Arndt,  Der  Geist  der  Zeit  (1806- 

18).      Z.  Werner,  Das  Kreuz  an  der  Ostsee. 

1807.  Richter,  Levana.     Z.  Werner,  Martin  Luther.    Kleist,  Amphi- 
tryon.     Gb'rres,    Die  teutschen    Volksbiicher.       Hegel,    Pheno- 
menologie    des    Geistes.       Fichte,     Reden     an     die     dentsche 
Nation  (1807-8).     [Mad.    de    Stael,    Corinne.     Wordsworth, 
Poems.  ] 

1808.  Goethe,  Faust ',  Erster  Teil.    Goethe's  interview  with  Napoleon 
at  Erfurt.     Die  Zeitungfiir  Einsiedler,     Kleist,   Penthesilea  ; 
Der  zerbrochene  Kriig  ;  Die  Hermannsschlacht  (publ.    1821). 
La   Motte  Fouque,   Sigurd  der   Schlangentbter.     F.  Schlegel, 
Die  Sprache  und  Weisheit  der  Indier.     [Scott,  Marmion.} 

1809.  Goethe,    Die   Wahlvcrwandtschaften.      A.    W.    Schlegel,    Vor- 
lesungen   iiber    drainatische  Kunst   und    Literal ur  (1809-11). 
Arnim    und  Brentano  in  Berlin.     Arnim,  Grafai  Dolores.     Z. 
Werner,  Der  vierundzwanzigste  Febrnar  (publ.  1815). 

1810.  Goethe,  Pandora;   Farbenlehre.      Kleist,  Michael  Kohlhaas ; 
Kiithchen    von    Heilbronn ;    Der  Prinz   vnn  Hamburg  (publ. 
1821). 

1811.  Goethe,  Dichtung  und   Wahrheit   (1811-33).      Arnim,    Halle 
und  Jerusalem.       Kleist's  death.       Fouque,    Undine.     B.   G. 
Niebuhr,  Romische  Geschichte  (1811-32).     [Jane  Austen,  Sense 
and  Sensibility.'} 

1812.  Tieck,  Phantasus  (1812-16).      The  brothers    Grimm,   Kinder- 
und  Hausmdrchen  (1812-15).     Arnim,   Isabella  von  Agyflen. 
K.  Th.  Korner,  Zriny.     A.  Milliner,  Der  ncunundz-wanzigste 
Februar.     [Byron,  Childe  Harold.} 

1813.  The  Battle  of  Leipzig.     Death  of  Wieland.     Ilebbel,  Lud- 
wig,  and  Wagner  born.     Arndt,  Lieder  fiir  Tcutsche.     Fouqu«?, 


304  CHRONOLOGICAL   TABLES. 

Der    Zauberring.      Milliner,    Die    Schuld.      [Shelley,  Queen 
Mab.~\ 

1814.  Founding  of  the  '  Deutsche  Bund.'    Korner,  Leier  und  Schwert. 
F.   Riickert,   Geharnischte  Sonette.      A.  von  Chamisso,  Peter 
Schlemihl.      E.   T.   A.   Hoffmann,  Phantasiestiicke  (1814-15). 
[Scott,   Waverley,     Wordsworth,    The  Excursion.] 

1815.  The   Battle  of   Waterloo.     Goethe,    Des  Epimenides  Er- 
ivachen.     Brentano,  Die  Griindung Prags.  J.  von  Eichendorff, 
Ahnungund  Gegentvart,     Hoffmann,  Die  Elixiere  des  Teufels. 
J.    L.   Uhland,    Gedichte    first    collected.       [Beranger,    Chan- 
sons. ] 

1816.  Goethe,    Italienische  Reise  (1816-17)  '•>    Kunst  und  Altertum 
(1816-32).        Oehlenschlager,      Correggio.       Uhland,    Vater- 
Idndische  Gedichte. 

1817.  A.    W.  Schlegel   professor  in    Bonn  (1817-45).      Arnim,    Die 
Kronenwdchter.      Brentano,    Geschichte  vom  braven   Kasperl. 
Hoffmann,  Nachtstiicke.     H.  Zschokke,  Das  Goldmacherdorf. 
Mad.  de  Stael,  De  FAllemagne  published.     Grillparzer,  Die 
Ahnfrau.     [Keats,  Poems.'] 

1818.  Grillparzer,    Sappho.       E.    K.    F.    Schulze,    Cdcilie   and   Die 
bezauberte  Rose.     Uhland,  Ernst,  Herzog  in   Schwaben.     W. 
Mu'ller,   Mullerlieder.     [Keats,  Endymion.~\ 

1819.  Goethe,   Der  westostliche  Divan.     Hoffmann,    Klein  Zaches ; 
Die  Serapionsbriider  (1819-21).      Tieck  settles   in   Dresden. 
J.  Grimm,  Deutsche  Grammatik  (1819-37).     A.  Schopenhauer, 
Die     Welt    als    Wille    und     Vorstellung.       Assassination    of 
Kotzehue.     [Byron,  Don  Juan,   I. -II.     Shelley,  The  Cenci.] 

1820.  Grillparzer,  Das    goldene    Vliess.      [Lamartine,    Meditations. 
Scott,  Jvanhoe.] 

1821.  Goethe,    Wilhelm  Meisters    Wanderjahre   (1821-29).      Tieck, 
Novellen  (1821-31).     W.  Miiller,  Gedichte;  Lieder der  Griechen 
(1821-24).    Hoffmann  von  Fallersleben,  Lieder  und  Romanzen. 
K.  M.  von  Weber,  Der  Freischutz.      A.  von  Platen,   Ghaselen. 
[De  Quincey,  The  Opium-eater.     Shelley,  Adonais.] 

1822.  F.  Riickert,  Ostliche  Rosen.      H.  Heine,  Gedichte  (first  collec- 
tion).   [V.   Hugo,    Odes.     Vigny,  Poemes.     Lamb,    Essays  of 
Elia.  ] 

1823.  F.  Riickert,  Liebesfriihling.     W.  Alexis,  Walladmor  (1823-24). 
Heine,  Tragbdien.     W.  Waiblinger,  Lieder  der  Griechen.     F. 
Raimund,    Der  Barometer macher.     F.    L.    G.   von    Raumer, 
Geschichte   der  Hohenstaufen    (1823-25).      [V.    Hugo,    Han 
d' Island.] 

1824.  H.  Zschokke,  Bilder  aus  der  Schweiz  (1824-26).     W.  Menzel, 
Geschichte  der  Dezttschen.     [Death  of  Byron.  ] 


CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES.  305 

1825.  Platen,    Sonette    aus    Venedig.      Grillparzer,    Kbnis;  Ottokars 

Gliick  und  Ende.  [Carlyle,  Life  of  SchilUr.  Manzoni,  / 
Promessi  Sposi.~\ 

1826.  Tieck,  Der  Aufruhr  in  den  Cevennen.     Eichendorff,  Aus  dan 

Leben  eines  Taugenichts.  W.  Hauff,  Lichtenstein.  Platen, 
Die  verhdngnisvolle  Gabel.  Heine,  Harzreise.  J.  Kerneri 
Gedichte.  Raimund.  Der  Bauer  als  Milliondr.  [A.  de  Vigny, 
Cinq-Mars.} 

1827.  Heine,  Buck  der  Lieder  ;  Reisebilder,  II.    Heine's  visit  to  Eng- 
land.   K.  Spindler,  Derjude.   Zedlitz,  Totenkrdnze.    [V.  Hugo, 
Cromwell.     Bulwer,  Pelham.~\ 

1828.  Platen,  Gedichte.     Grillparzer,  Ein  treuer  Diener  seines  Herrn. 
Raimund,  Der  Alpenkonig  und  der  Menschenfeind.      Immer- 
mann,    Das    Trauerspiel    in    Tirol.       G.    Schwab,     Gedichte 
(1828-29).     Death  of  Duke  Karl  August  of  Weimar. 

1829.  Platen,    Der  romantische  Oedipus.     Grabhe,    Don  Juan    und 
Faust.       M.    Beer,    Struensee.      J.  Kerner,   Die    Seherin  von 
Prevorst.     [V.    Hugo,     Orientales.      A.    Dumas,    Henri   III. 
Balzac,    Comedie  humaine  (1829-50).] 

1830.  [The  July    Revolution    in    Paris.]     Chamisso,  Frauenliebe 
und  Leben.     Platen,  Polenlieder  (1830-33).      L.  Borne,  Brief e 
aus  Paris  (1830-33).     A.  Griin,  Blatter  der  Liebe  ;  Der  letzte 
Ritter.     [V.    Hugo,  Hernani.     Tennyson,  Poems.} 

1831.  Chamisso,    Gedichte  (first  collected).     Grillparzer,   Des  Meeres 
und    der    Liebe     Wellen.       Grabbe,     Napoleon.        A.     Grtin, 
Spaziergdnge   eines    Wiener  Poeten.     Heine    settles   in    Paris. 
[V.  Hugo,  Nolre-Dame  de  Paris  ;  Marion  Delorme.    Stendhal, 
Le  Rouge  et  le  Noir.  ] 

1832.  The  death  of  Goethe.     Goethe,  Faust,  Zweiter  Teil.     Immer- 
mann,  Merlin.     Riickert,  Haus-  undjahreslieder.     E.  Mo'rike, 
Maler  Nolten.     W.  Alexis,  Cabanis.     N.  Lenau,  Gedichte  (first 
collected). 

1833.  Raimund,  Der   Verschivender.     H.    Laube,  Das  junge  Europe 
(1833-37).     J.   Nestroy,  Lumpacivagabuniius.     F.   Freiligrath, 
Gedichte    (first    collection).       Heine,    Franzbsische    Ztistande. 
[G.   Sand,   Lelia.     Carlyle,  Sartor  Resartus.] 

1834.  Eicliendorff,    Dichter  und  ihre   Gesellen.       Riickert,    Gedichte 
(1834-38).      I,.    Wienbarg,   Asihetische  Feldziige.      Heine,  Der 
Salon    (1834-40).      Grillparzer,   Der    Trauin    ein   Leben.      C. 
Sealsfield,   Der  Virey  tmd  die  Aristokraten.     L.    von  Ranke, 
Die  rbmischen  Pdpste  (1834-36).     [Lamennais,    Paroles  dun 
croyant.     Bulwer,  The  Last  Days  of  Pompeii.} 

1835.  The  decree  against  '  Jungdeutschland.'     B.  von  Arnim,  Goethes 
Briefwechsel  mit  einem  Kind.     Grillparzer,  Tristia  ex  Ponto. 

U 


306  CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES. 

K.  Gutzkow,   Wally  die  Z~<.veiflerin.  Th.   Mundt,  Madonna. 

D.  F.  Strauss,  Das  Leben  Jesu.  G.  G.  Gervinus,  Geschichte 
der  deutschen  Nationalist 'eratur. 

1836.  Tieck,    Der  junge    Tischlermeister.  Riickert.    Weisheit   der 

Brahmanen  (1836-39).  Immermann,  Die  Epigonen.  Lenau, 
Faust.  [Musset,  Confessions  d"un  enfant  du  siecle.  Lamar- 
tine,  Jocelyn.  Dickens,  Pickwick  Papers.  Gogol,  The 
Revisor.  ] 

1837.  [Accession  of  Queen  Victoria  in  England.],  Eichendorff, 
Gedichte  (first  collected).     Lenau,  Savonarola.     B.  Auerbach, 
Spinoza.     [G.   Sand,  Mauprat.     Carlyle,   The  French  Revolu- 
tion. ] 

1838.  Grillparzer,   Weh'  de»i,  der  lugt.   •  Morike,   Gedichte  (first  col- 
lected).   Immermann,  Miinchhattsen.    A.  von  Droste-Hulshoff, 
Gedichte.  K.  Beck,  Gepanzerte  Lieder.     [V.  Hugo,  Ruy  Bias.] 

1839.  Ranke,  Deutsche  Geschichte  (1830-47).      [Stendhal,  La  Char- 
treuse de  Panne. ~\ 

1840.  Accession     of    Friedrich     Wilhelm     IV.     of    Prussia. 
Tieck,  Vittoria  Accorombona.     Heine,  Lud-vig  Borne.     Immer- 
mann, Dilsseldorfer  Anfiinge.      Hoffmann  von    Fallersleben, 
Unpolitische  Lieder  (1840-41).     W.  Alexis,   Der  Roland  von 
Berlin.    E.  Geibel,  Gedichte.    C.  F.  Hebbel, /*«&*/&.    [Dickens, 
Oliver  Twist.     Browning,  Sordello.     Scribe,   Le  verre  d'eau. 
Merimee,   Colomba.~\ 

1841.  The  political  lyric  (N.  Becker,  R.  E.  Prutz,  M.  Schneckenburg, 
F.    Freiligrath,    G.    Herwegh).      G.    Herwegh,    Gedichte  eines 
Lebendigen  (1841-44).      E.  Geibel,  Zeitstimmen.     J.  Gotthelf, 
Uli   der  Knecht.       Feuerbach,   Das  Wesen  des   Christentums. 
[A.  Dumas,    Monte   Cristo   (1841-45).       Carlyle,   On  Heroes. 
Emerson,  Essays.  ] 

1842.  Lenau,  Die  Albigenser.     W.    Alexis,   Der  falsche   Waldemar. 
F.    Dingelstedt,   Lieder  eines  kosmopolitischen  Nachtwcichters. 
M.   von   Strachwitz,    Lieder   eines  Erivachenden.       \' .    Halm, 
Der  Sohn  der  Wildnis.      Hebbel,  Gedichte  (1842,  1848,  1857). 
R.  Wagner,  Rienzi.     [G.  Sand,  Consuelo.    Gogol,  Dead  Souls. 
Macaulay,  Lays  of  Ancient  Rome.] 

1843.  Gutzkow,  Zopf  und  Schwert.      Hebbel,  Genoveva.     Auerbach, 
Schwarzwalder  Dorfgeschichten  (1843-54).      E.  Geibel,    Volks- 
lieder  und  Romanzen  der  Spanier.      R.  Wagner,  Der  Jliegende 
Hollander.     [Ponsard,  Lucrece.~\ 

1844.  Heine,   Neue  Gedichte  ;  Deutschland.     Freiligrath,  Ein  Glau- 
bensbekemitnis.     A.   Stifter,  Studien.       Hebbel,   Maria  Mag- 
dalene.       I.     Hahn  -  Hahn,   Aus   der    Gesellschaft.       F.    Th. 


CHRONOLOGICAL   TABLES.  307 

Vischer,    Kritische   Gating.      [A.    Dumas,   l.cs  trots  Monsqite- 
taires.] 

1845.  R.  Wagner,  Tannhduser.    A.  von  Humboldt,  Kosmos  (1845-58). 

1846.  Freiligrath,    Ca  ira.      W.    Alexis,   Die  Hosen  Jus  Herrn  von 
Bredow.      G.   Kinkel,    Otto  dcr  Schiitz.      [Thackeray,    Vanity 
Fair  (1846-48).      Dickens,    Dombey   and   Son.      Dostoevski, 
Poor  Folk.] 

1847.  Heine,  Atta   Troll.     Eichendorff,  Die  neuc  roinantische  Poesic 
in  Deutschland,     Gutzkow,  Uriel  Acosta.     Laube,  Die  Karh- 
schiiler.     G.    Freytag,    Die    Valentine.     Geibel,  Juninslieder. 
[Ch.    Bronte,  Jane   Eyre.      Merimee,    Carmen.     Longfellow, 
Evangeline.  ] 

1848.  [The  March  Revolution.]    Grillpaizer,  Der  arme  Spielmann. 
Freytag,  Graf  Waldemar.    Ch.   Birch-Pfeiffer,  Dorf  und  Stadt. 
Freytag  and  Julian  Schmidt  become  editors  of  the  Grenzboten. 
[E.    Augier,    L  Aventuriere.       Macaulay,   History  of  England 
(1848-61).] 

1849.  Bettina  von  Arnim,  Dies  Buck  geh'drt  dein  Konig.     Freiligrath, 
Nette  politische  und  soziale  Gedichte.     Gutzkow,  Der  Konigs- 
leutnant.      O.    von    Redwitz,    Amaranth.       R.    Wagner,   Die 
Kunst  nnd  die  Revolution.     [Chateaubriand,  Memoires  d~oi<tre- 
tombe.     Thackeray,  Pendennis  (1849-50).] 

1850.  Gutzkow,   Die  Kitter  -voiit    Gcist  (1850-52),      Laube    becomes 
director  of  the  Hofburgtheater  (1850-67).     J.   Gotthelf,  Elsi, 
die  seltsame  Magd.     G.  Keller  in  Berlin  (1850-55).     Hebbel, 
Herodes  und  Mariainne.      O.   Ludwig,   Der  Erbfbrster.      R. 
Wagner,  Lohengrin  ;  Das  Kunstwerk  der  Zukunft.     R.  Schu- 
mann, Genoveva.     P.  Heyse,  Francesca  da  Rimini.    [Dickens, 
David  Copperfield.     Tennyson,  In  Memoriam.     Sainte-Beuve, 
Lundis  (1850-69).] 

1851.  Heine,    Romanzero.      R.   Wagner,    Opcr  und  Drama.     Geibel 
invited    to   Munich.     Freiligrath   settles   in  London.      A.   von 
Droste-Hiilshoff,  Das  gcistliche  Jahr.     Bodenstedt,  I.ieder  des 
Mirza  Schaffy. 

18-52.  Brentano,  Romanzen  voin  Rosenkranze  published.  \V.  Alexis, 
Ruhe  ist  die  erste  Biirgerpflicht.  Th.  Storm,  Immensee. 
Hebbel,  Agnes  Bernauer.  G.  Freytag,  Die  Journalisten. 
W.  Jordan,  Demiurgos  (1852-54).  A.  Stifter,  Bunte  Stcine. 
K.  Groth,  Quickborn.  [V.  Hugo,  Chatiments.'} 

1853.  Wagner,  Der  Ring  des   Nibelungen  (poem  completed).      O. 
Ludwig,  Die  Makkabder.     F.    Reuter,  Lditschens  tin  Rimels. 
[Thackeray,    The  Newcomes,~\ 

1854.  Keller,    Der   griine    Heinrich    (1854-55).       F.    Halm,    Dcr 


308  CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES. 

Fechter  von  Ravenna.  J.  W.  von  Scheffel,  Der  Trompeter 
von  Sdkkingen.  Th.  Mommsen,  Romische  Geschichte  (1854- 
56).  [Augier,  Le  Gendre  de  M.  Poirier.  Thackeray, 
Esmond.  ] 

1855.  Freytag,   Soil  und  Haben,      E.   Mbrike,  Mozart  auf  der  Reise 
nach  Prag.     P.  Heyse,  first  volume  of  Novellen.     L.  Biichner, 
Kraft  und  Staff.     [Longfellow,  Hiawatha.~\ 

1856.  Death  of  Heine.     Laube,   Graf  Essex.     Hebbel,    Gyges  und 
sein  Ring.     O.  Ludwig,  Zwischen  Himmel  und  Erde.     A.  E. 
Brachvogel,  Narziss.     Keller,  Die  Leute  von  Seldwyla  (1856- 
74).     W.   H.  Riehl,  Kulturgeschichtliche  Novellen.     H.  Hett- 
ner,  Literaturgeschichte    des  \achtzehnten  Jahrhunderts  (1856- 
70).     [Turgenev,  Rudin.~\ 

1857.  E.  Geibel,  Neue  Gedichte.     J.  V.  von  Scheffel,  Ekkehard.     A. 
Stifter,  Der  Nachsoinmer.      R.    Hamerling,   Sangesgruss  voni 
Stade   des   Adria.       W.    Raabe,    Chronik   der   Sperlingsgasse. 
[Flaubert,     Madame    Bovary.       Thackeray,    The    Virginians 

(I857-59)-] 

1858.  Gtttzkow,  Der  Zauberer  von  Rom.    Geibel,  Brunhild.    [Tenny- 
son, Idylls  of  the  King.~\ 

1859.  Hebbel,  Mutter  und  Kind.      Freytag,  Bilder  aus  der  deutschen 

Vergangenheit  (18^9-62).  Wagner,  Tristan  und  Isolde. 
[Darwin,  Origin  of  Species.  G.  Eliot,  Adam  Bede.  G. 
Meredith,  Richard  Feverel.  V.  Hugo,  Legende  des  Siecles.] 

1860.  F.  Reuter,  Ut  de  Franzosentid.      F.  Spielhagen,  Problematische 

Naturen.  J.  Burckhardt,  Die  Kultur  der  Renaissance  in  Italien. 
[Tolstoi,  War  and  Peace.  G.  Eliot,  The  Mill  on  the  Floss. 
Bjornson,  A  Happy  Boy.~\ 

1861.  Accession  of  Wilhelm   I.   King  of  Prussia.     E.  Geibel, 
Miinchener   Dichterbuch.       F.    Dahn,    Konige    der    Germanen 
(1861-72).     [V.    Sardou,  Nos  Intimes.     Dostoevski,  Memoirs 
of  a  Dead  House  (1861-62).] 

1862.  Hebbel,  Die  Nibelungen.    Reuter,  Ut  mine  Stromtid(  1 862-64). 
[V.  Hugo,  Les  Miserables.    Leconte  de  Lisle,  Poemes  barbares. 
Turgenev,  Fathers  and  Sons.     Flaubert,  Salammbd.     H.  Ibsen, 
Comedy  of  Love.  ~\ 

1863.  Death   of  Hebbel.      Reuter,    Ut  mine  Festungstid.      Freytag, 
Die   Technik  des  Dramas.      [G.  Eliot,    Romola.      Ibsen,    The 
Pretenders, .] 

1864.  Freytag,      Die     verlorene     Handschrift.        G.     Ebers,     Eine 
agyptische     Konigstochter.       W.     Raabe,    Der    Hungerpastor. 
Dingelstedt,     Shakespeare's     '  Konigsdramen '     performed     in 
Weimar.       K.     F.     Meyer,    Gedichte.       Performances    of    the 


CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES.  309 

Meiningen  Court  Theater  (1864-89).  [E.  and  J.  de  Gon- 
court,  Rente  Mauperin.} 

1865.  Laube,    Der  deutsche  Krieg  (1865-67).      Auerbach.   Auf  der 
Hiihe.     W.   Busch,   Max  und  Morits.     Wagner,    Tristan  und 
Isolde.     [Tolstoi,    War  and  Peace  (1865-69).     Taine.   Philoto- 
phiederart(  1865-69).] 

1866.  War  between  Prussia  and  Austria.    Spielhagen,  In  ReiK 
und  Glied.       H.    Lingg,    Die    Vdlkerwanderung  (1866-68). 
R.    Hamerling,  Ahasver  in   Rom.      P.    Heyse,   Hans  Lange. 
[Ibsen,  Brand.     Dostoevski,  Crime  and  Punishment.     Swin- 
burne, Poems  and  Ballads.] 

1867.  Scheffel,  Gaudeamus.     K.  F.  Meyer.  Balladen .     K.  Marx,  Das 
Kapital,  vol.  i.     [Ibsen,  Peer  Gynt.     Turgenev,  Smoke.} 

1868.  W.   Jordan,    Die   Nibelnnge   (1868-72).     M.    Greif,    Gedichte. 

P.  Heyse,  Colberg.  W.  Jensen,  Die  braune  Erica.  Wagner, 
Die  Meistersinger  von  Niirnberg.  [Dostoevski,  The  Idiot. 
Browning,  The  Ring  and  the  Rook  (1868-69).] 

1869.  Spielhagen,  Hammer  und  Amboss.      R.  Hamerling,  Der  Kbnig 
von  Sion.      E.   von  Hartmann,  Philosophic  des  Unbewussten. 
[Flaubert,  1} Education  sentimentale.} 

1870.  The  Franco-German  War  (1870-71).      H.  Lorm,  Gedichte. 
L.  Anzengruber,  Der  Pfarrer  von  Kirchfeld.     [D.  G.  Rossetti, 
Poems.  } 

1871.  Founding  of  the  German  Empire.     E.  Geibel,  herolds- 
rufe.      K.    F.    Meyer,   Huttens  letzte  Tage.     A.   Lindner,  Die 
Bhithochzeit.     Anzengruber,  Der  Meineidbauer.     [E.  Zola,  Les 
Rougon- Macquart  (1871-93).] 

1872.  Death    of  Grillparzer.      Grillparzer,   Libussa,  Die  Jildin  von 

Toledo,  Ein  Brnderzwist  published.  Freytag,  Die  Ahncn 
(1872-80).  G.  Keller,  Sieben  Legenden.  Anzengruber,  Der 
Kreuzelschreiber.  [G.  Eliot,  Middlemarch.  G.  Braiuies,  Main 
Currents  of  European  Literature  (1872-76).] 

1873.  P.    Heyse,  Kinder  der   IVelt.       F.    Nietxsrhe,    Unzeitigemiisse 
Betrachtungen  (1873-76).     [Ibsen,   Emperor  and  Galilean.} 

1874.  Schack,  Nachte  des  Orients.     G.   Keller,  Leute  von  Seldwyla, 
ii.     Anzengruber,  Der  G'-wissenswiinn.     [A.  Daudet,  Fromonl 

jeune  et  Risler  aine.     Tolstoi,  Anna  Karenina  (1874-76).] 

1875.  J.    Wolff,    Der   Rattcnf linger   ran   Hameln.     A.    Fitger,    Die 
Hexe,     M.  von  Ebner-Eschenbacb,  Erzdhlnngen.     [H.  Taine, 
Uancien  regime  (1875-90).] 

1876.  Wagner,  Der  Ring  des  Nibehmgen  at  Bayreuth.     Spielhagen, 
Sturmflut.      P.    Heyse,  ////  Paradiese.     F.  Dahn,  Ein  Kampf 
urn  Rom.      K.   F.    Meyer,  Jiirg  Jenatsch. 


3IO  CHRONOLOGICAL    TABLES. 

1877.  Storm,  Chroniknovellen  (1877-86).     F.  von  Saar,  Novellen  aus 
Osterreich    (1877-97).      R-    Baumbach,    Zlatarog.      [Tuvgenev, 
Virgin  Soil.     Ibsen,   The  Pillars  of  Society.] 

1878.  G.  Keller,  Ziiricher  Novellen,    H.  Leuthold,  Gedichte.    Anzen- 
gruber,    Das   vierte    Gebot.     F.    W.    Weber,    Dreizehnlinden. 
Th.  Fontane,   Vor  dem  Sturm.     F.  Nissel,  Agnes  von  Meran. 
F.  Nietzsche,  AIenschlich.es,  Allzumenschliches  (1878-79). 

1879.  H-  Leuthold,  Gedichte.     Vischer,  Auch  Einer.     [G.  Meredith, 
The  Egoist.     Ibsen,  A  Doll's  House.'} 

1880.  K.  F.   Meyer,  Der  Heilige.     Th.  Fontane,  Crete  Minde.     E. 
Wildenbruch,  Der  Meister  von   Tanagra.      Q.    P.  Jacobsen, 
Niels  Lyhne.] 

1881.  Keller,  Das  Sinngedicht.   E.  von  Wildenbruch,  Die  Karolinger. 
Nietzsche,  Morgenrbte.     [Ibsen,  Ghosts.'} 

1882.  R.  Wagner,  Parsifal.      Wildenbruch,  Harold;  Der  Mennonit. 

II.  und  J.  Hart,  Kritische  Wa/engiinge  (1882-84). 

1883.  Death  of  Wagner.    Nietzsche,  Also  sprach  Zarathiistra.    D.  von 
Liliencron,  Adjiitantenritte.     Fontane,  Schach  von  Wuthenow. 
Ebner-Eschenbach,  Dorf-und  Schlossgeschichten.    K.  F.  Meyer, 
Novellen. 

1884.  K.  F.  Meyer,  Die  Hochzeit  des  Monchs.      [Ibsen,    The   Wild 
Duck.-} 

1886.  Keller,    Martin    Salander.       Wildenbruch,    Das    neue    Gebot. 
Heyse,  Der  Roman  der  Stiftsdamc.     Nietzsche,  Jenseits  -von 
Gut  und  Base. 

1887.  M.    von   Ebner-Eschenliach,    Das   Gemeindekind.      II.   Suder- 
mann,  Frau  Sorge.      \\.   and  J.   Hart,   Lied  der  Menschheit. 
[Tolstoi,  Powers  of  Darkness.] 

1888.  Accession  of  Wilhelm  II.,  German  Emperor.      Wilden- 
bruch, Die  Quitzows.     H.  Sudermann,  Die  Ehre.     Fontane, 
Irrungen,  Wirrungen.     M.  Kretzer,  Meisler  Timpe.     Conrad, 
Was  die  Jsar  rauscht. 

1889.  Wilbrandt,  Der  Meister  von  Palmyra.     A.  Holz  und  J.  Schlaf, 
Die   Fantilie   Selicke,     G.    Hauptmann,    Vor  Sonnenaufgang. 
Nietzsche,    Gotzendammerung.     Sudermann,  Der  Katzensteg. 

1890.  Anzengruber,  Der  Fleck  atif  der  Ehr.     I.   Kurz,  Florentine}- 
Novellen.     Stefan   George,  Hymnen. 

1891.  E.  von  Wildenbruch,  Die  Haubenlerche.      Sudermann,  Sodoms 
Ende.        Hauptmann,     Einsame     Menschen.       R.     Dehmel, 
Erlosungen.     [Ibsen,  Hedda   Gabler.     M.   Maeterlinck,   Prin- 
cesse  Maleine.~\ 

1892.  Hauptmann,    Die   Weber;    Kollege   Crampton.       H.  von   Hof- 
mannsthal,  Gestern  ;  Der  Tod  Tizians.     [E.  Zola,  Le  Debacle.] 


CHRONOLOGICAL   TABLES.  311 

1893.  Hauptmann,  Hanneles  Himmelfahrt ;  Der  Bibcrpelz.     Suder- 
mann,    Heiinat.      L.     Fulda,    Der    Talisman.      M.     Halbc, 

Jugemi.      R.    Huch,   Ludolf  Ursleit. 

1894.  Sudermann,  JEs  war. 

1895.  Fontane,    Effi    Briest.      D.    von    Liliencron,    Kriegsnovellen. 
Hauptmann,    Florian    Geyer.       Stefan    George,    Buchcr    der 
Hirten.     [T.  Hardy, yir/ife  the  Obscure.} 

1896.  Wildenbruch,    Heinrich    it/id  Heinrichs    Gescklechl.       Haupt- 

mann,  Die  versunkenc  Glocke.      R.    Dehmel,  Weib  and  Well. 
1898.   Sudermann,    Johannes.       Hauptmann,    Ftihrmann    Henschel. 

Death  of  Bismarck.     [E.    Rostand,    Cyrano  de  Bergerac.~\ 
1900.   Death  of  Nietzsche.      Sudermann,  Johannesfciter.     S.  George, 

Der    Teppich   des   Lebens.     [Ibsen,    When   ^ve   dead  awaken. 

Tolstoi,  Resurrection.} 


INDEX. 


Ahbt,  Th.,  133 

Abraiiam   a  Santa  Clara   (Ulrich 

Megerle),  91  ff. 
Alberus,  E.,  61,  71 
Albrecht  von  Halberstadt,  33 
Albrechf  von  Scharfenbeig,  43 
Alexis,  W.  (W.  Haring),  235  f. 
Alliterative  verse,  6 
Alpharts  Tod,  30 
Alxinger,  J.  B.  von,  132 
Amis,  Der  Pfaffe,  45,  60 
Anacreontic  poetry,  114 
Anegenge,  14 
Angelus    Silesius    (J.    Scheffler), 

87 

Atmohed,  Das,  14  f. 

Antichrist  (Latin  drama),  19 

Anton  Ulrich  (Duke  of  Bruns- 
wick), 97 

Anzengruber,  L.,  281  f. ,  285 

Arndt,  E.  M.,  206  f. 

Arnim,  Bettina  von,  203,  248  f. 

Arnim,  L.  A.  von,  200  ff.,  231 

Arthur,  King,  29,  32 

Attila  (Etzel),  5,  20,  24  f. 

Auerbach,  B.,  256 

Aufklarung.     See  Rationalism 

Austria,  literature  in,  118  f., 
132  f.,  151,  214  ff.,227fT.,  252, 
275,  284 

Ava,  Frau,  14 

Avenarius,  F.,  280 

Ayrenhoff,  C.  H.  von,  151 

Ayrer,  J.,  80 


Babo,  J.  M.,  150 
Bahr,  H.,  284 
Bards,  the,  118  f. 
Baudissin,  W.,  197 
Bauernfeld,  E.  von,  219 
Baumbach,  R. ,  273 
Baumgarten,  A.  G. ,  113 
Beast  epic  and  fable,    II,    i7f-> 

60  f.,  112 
Beck,  K.,  25 2  f. 
Becker,  N.,  249 
Beethoven,  L.  van,  22O  f. 
Beheim,  M.,  64 
Benedix,  R.,  271 
Berthold  von  Holle,  45 
Berthold  von  Regensburg.  55 
Besser,  J.  von,  100,  190 
Bible,  German  translations  of  the, 

67,  69  f. 

Bible,  the  Gothic,  5 
Biblical  drama,  19,  73  f. 
Bierbaum,  O.  J.,  280 
Birch- Pfeiffer,  Ch.,  271 
Birck,  S.,  73 
Biterolf  tmd  Dietlieb,  29 
Bleibtreu,  K.,  285 
Blumauer,  J.  A.,  132 
Blumenorden,       Der       gekronte 

(Pegnitz  Shepherds),  83 
Bodenstedt,  F.,  272  f. 
Bodmer,  J.  J.,  101  f.,  105,  107  f., 

U3 

Bohlau,  H.,  285 
Bohme,  J.,  87 


INDEX. 


313 


Boie,  H.  C.,  138 

Boner,  U.,  60  f. 

Bonifacius  (Winfrith),  7 

Borck,  K.  W.  von,  no 

Borkenstein,  H.,  no 

Borne,  L. ,  244  ff. 

Brachvogel,  A.  E.,  271 

Brant,  S.,  62,  67,  71 

Brawe,  J.  W.  von,  122 

Breitinger,    J.    J.,    101    f.,    105, 

107  f. 

Bremer  Beitrage,  Die,  109,  116 
Hrentano,  C.  M.,  200  ff.,  231 
Brockes,  B.  H..  104 
Biichner,  G.,  104 
Bucholtz,  A.  H.,  97 
Burckhardt,  J.,  259 
Burger,  G.  A.,  140  f. 
Biirgerliche  Tragodie,  the,  121  f., 

127,  150,  157,  184,  266 
Burkhart  von  Hohenfels,  52 
Busch,  W.,  276 
Busse,  K.,  280 
Byron,     influence    of,     227     ff. , 

237  f- 

Canitz,  R.  von,  100 
Carmina  Bur  ana,  18 
Chamisso,   A.   von,   202,  204  f. , 

231 
Charles  the  Great  (Charlemagne, 

Karl  der  Grosse),  7,  29,  58 
Christus  und  die  Samariterin,  9 
Claudius,  M.,  140 
Colin,  Ph.,  58 
Collin,  H.  J.  von,  214,  227 
Conrad,  M.  G.,  285 
Conradi,  H.,  285 
Court  epic,  17,  32  ff. 
Cramer,  J.  A.,  109 
Cronegk,  J.  F.  von,  122 
Crusades,  the,  16  ff.,  57  f. 

Dach,  S.,  84 
Dahn,  F.,  259  f. 
Dauthendey,  M.,  280 
David  of  Augsburg,  55 
Dedekind,  F.,  76 
Dehmel,  R.,  280 
Deinhardstein,  J.  L.,  271 
Denis,  M.,  118  f. 


Deutsch,  meaning  of,  I 

Dietmar  von  Aist,  18 

Dietrich  von   Bern  (Verona),    20, 

24,  28  ff. 

Dietrichs  Fluckt,  30 
Dingelstedt,  F. ,  252 
Disticha  Catonis,  53 
Dorfpoesie,  hofische,  51  f. 
Drama,    beginnings    of    the,    19, 

72  ff. 

Dranmor  (F.  von  Schmid),  274 
Dreikonigsspiel,  1 9 
Droste-Hiilshoff,  A.  von,  229  f. 

Easter  Plays,  19 
Ebers,  G.,  259 
Ebert,  J.  A.,  109  f. 
Ebner-Eschenbach,  M.  von,  285 
Ecbasis  Captivi,  11,17 
Eckenlied,  Das,  29 
Eckhart,  Meister,  67 
Eichendorff,  J.  von,  205  f.,  228  f. 
Eike  von  Repgowe,  55 
Eilhart  von  Oberge,  17,  33 
Ekkehard  of  St  Gall  ( Walthari- 

lied),  10 

Elbschwanenorden,  the,  83 
Engel,  J.  J.,  133 
Englische  Komodianten,  80  f. 
Epic,  Court,    Popular,   &c.      See 

Court  Epic,  &c. 
Kpiphany  Plays,  19 
Epistola:  obscuroruiii  zv/wv/w,  68  f. 
Erasmus,  D.,  68 
Ermanarich,  5,  20,  65 
Eulenspiegel,  Tyl,  60 
Exodus,    Middle    High    German 

translations  of,  14 
Ezzolied  Da:,  14  f. 

Fables,  60  f.,  112 

Falke,  G.,  280 

Fastnachtsspiele,  72>  75 

Fate-tragedy  (Schicksalstragodie), 
the,  210  f. ,  239 

Faust  (Volksbuch),  78.  See  also 
Goethe,  Grabbe,  Klinger, 
Lenau,  Lessing,  F.  Mtiller 

Feuerbach,  L.  A.,  254 

Fichte,  J.  G.,  179  f.,  199 

Fischart.  J.,  76  f..  92 


314 


INDEX. 


Fitger,  A.,  281 

Fleck,  K.,  44 

Fleming,  P.,  84,  86 

Floris  und  Blancheflur,  1 7 

Folz,  H. ,  60,  64,  72 

Fontane,  Th.,  284 

Forster,  J.  G.,  152 

Fouque,  F.  de  la  Motte,  231  f. 

Frauenlob ( Heinrich von  Meissen), 

64 
Frederick   the   Great,    100,    112, 

114 

Freidank,  54 
Freiligrath,  F.,  250  f. 
Frenssen,  G.,  285 
Freytag,  G.,  257  ff. 
Friedrich  von  Hausen,  48 
Frischlin,  Ph.  N.,  73 
Fruchtbringende  Gesellschaft,  the 

(Palmenorden),  83 
Fiietrer,  U.,  58 
Fulda,  L.,  284 

Gartner,  K.  C.,  109 

Garve,  Ch.,  133 

Gaudy,  F.  von,  238 

Geibel,  E.,  253,  272 

Geiler,  J.,  67,  71 

Gellert,  Ch.  F.,  109,  ill  f. ,  114 

Gemmingen,  O.  H.  von,  150 

Genesis,  Old  Saxon,  8 

Genesis,  Voratier  Genesis,  14 

Gengenbach,  P.,  72 

Gentz,  F.  von,  206 

Georg,  Das  Lied  vom  heiligen,  9 

George,  S.,  280 

Gerhardt,  P.,  88  f. 

German,  meaning  of,  i 

Gerstacker,  F.,  263  f. 

Gerstenberg,    H.    W.    von,    118, 

143,  148 

Gervinus,  G.  G.,  253 
Gessner,  S. ,  1 19 
Giesebrecht,  W.,  258 
Gilm,  H.,  253 

Gleim,  J.  W.  L.,  ii3ff.,  118 
Glosses,  Old  High  German,  7 
Gluck,  C.  W.  von,  125 
Gockingk,  L.  F.  G.  von,  140 
Goldemar,  29 
Goliards,  the,  18 


Gorres,  J.  J.  von,  200  ff. 

Goethe, 'J.  W.  von,  134,  136  f., 
143  ff.,  154,  161  ff.,  184  ff.  ; 
Dichtnngund  Wahrheit,  iSjf.; 
Egmont,  165;  Fails t,  147  f. , 
162,  187  ff.  ;  Gbtz  von  Berlich- 
ingen,  142  f.,  146$.  ;  Hermann 
und  Dorothea,  169  f. ;  Iphigenie 
auf  Tauris,  162  ff.  ;  Lyric 
poetry,  ballads,  162,  170; 
Tasso,  164  f.  ;  Die  Wahlver- 
ivandtschaften,  185 ;  Werlher, 
146  f.,  151  f. ;  Der  ivestbstliche 
Divan,  186  f.  ;  Wilhelni  Meis- 
ter,  152,  166  ff.,  181  ff. 

Gothic  Bible,  the,  5 

Gotter,  F.  W.,  138 

Gottfried  von  Neifen,  52 

Gottfried  von  Strassburg,  33, 
39  ff.,  44,  48 

Gotthelf,  J.  (A.  Bitzius),  256 

Gottinger  Dichterbund  (Hain), 
the,  137  ff. 

Gottschall,  R.  von,  271 

Gottsched,  J.  Ch.,  looff.,  107  ff. 

Gottsched,  L.  A.,  101 

Gotz,  J.  N.,  ii3f. 

Grabbe,  Ch.  D.,  213  f. 

Gral,  the,  36  ff. 

Greif,  M.  (H.  Frey),  273 

Griepenkerl,  R.,  271 

Grillparzer,  F.,  214  ff.,  228 

Grimm,  J.  and  W.,  202 

Grim  melshausen,  J.  J.   Ch.   von, 

93  f- 

Grobianus,  76  f. 

Groth,  K.,  257 

Griin,  A.  (A.  A.  von  Auersperg), 

227 

Gryphius,  A.,  84  f.,  95 
Gudrim  (K'udrun),  26  ff. 
Gtinther,  J.  Ch.,  100 
Gutzkow,  K.,  242,  246 f.,  263 

Hadamar  von  Laber,  59 

Hadlaub,  J.,  52 

Hagedorn,  F.  von,  104  ff.,  112  f., 

158 

Hahn-Hahn,  I.,  264 
Hain,  der  Gottinger,  137  ff. 
Halbe,  M.,  284 


INDEX. 


315 


Haller,  A.  von,  io6f.,  114  f. 
Halm,  F.  (E.  von  Munch- Belling- 

hausen),  219 
Hamann,  J.  G.,  134 
Hamerling,  R.,  274  f. 
Happel,  E.  W.,  97 
Hardenberg,    F.    L.    von.      See 

Novalis 

Harsdorffer,  G.  P.,  83 
Hart,  H.  and  J.,  280 
Hartleben,  O.  E.,  284 
Hartmann  (  Vom  Glatiben],  14 
Hartmann  von  Aue,  33  ff. ,  42  f. , 

48 

Hartmann,  E.  von,  274 
Hartmann,  M.,  252  f. 
Hauff,  W.,  225,  235 
Hauptmann,  G.,  281  ff. 
Haupt-  und  Staatsaktionen,  101 
Haym,  R..  276 
Hebbel,  Ch.  F.,  265  ff. 
Hebel,  J.  P.,  183 
Hegel,  G.  W.  F.,  241,  254,  274, 

278  f. 
Heidelberg      Romanticists,    the, 

200  ff. 

Heine,  H.,  242  ff. 
Heinrich  der  Glichezare,  18 
Heinrich  Julius,  Duke  of  Bruns- 
wick, 80 

Heinrich  von  Freiberg,  42 
Heinrich  von  Laufenberg,  66 
Heinrich  von    Meissen    (Frauen- 

lob),  64 

Heinrich  von  Melk,  14 
Heinrich  von  Morungen,  48 
Heinrich  von  Mtigeln,  64 
Heinrich  von  Tiirlin,  43 
Heinrich  von  Veldeke,  33,  48 
Heinrico,  De,  9 
Heinse,  J.  J.,  152 
Heinzlein  of  Constance,  59 
Helbling,  Seifried,  54 
Heldenbuch,  Das,  28  ff.,  59 
Heliand,  Der,  8f.,  12 
Henckell,  K. ,  280 
Herbert  von  Fritslar,  33 
Herder,  J.  F.,  I34ff.,  142,  144 f., 

201 

Herger,  19 
Hermann  von  Sachsenheim,  59 


Hermann  (or  Johannes)  von  Salz- 
burg, 66 

Hermes,  J.  T.,  133 

Heroic  novels,  97 

Hertz,  W.,  274 

Herwegh,  G.,  250!. 

Herzog  Ernst,  1 6 

Hesse,  H.,  285 

Hettner,  H.,  276 

Heyse,  P.,  262  f. ,  275 

Hildebrandslied,  Das,  6,  8,  12,  65 

Hillebrand,  K.,  276 

Hiltbold  von  Schwangau,  51 

Hinrik  van  Alkmar,  61 

Hippel,  T.  G.  von,  133 

Hofburgtheater  in  Vienna,  the, 
151,  214,  248 

Hofische  Epos,  the,  17,  32  ff. 

Hoffmann,  E.  T.  A.,  232  ff. 

Hoffmann  von  Fallersleben,  A. 
H.,  207,  252 

Hofmann  von  Hofmannswaldau, 
C.  H.  von,  96 

Hofmannsthal,  H.  von,  284 

Hofpoeten,  the,  100 

Holderlin,  F.,  183  f. 

H61ty,  L.  H.  C.,  I39f. 

Holz,  A.,  280 

Houvvald,  C.  E.  von,  211 

Hrotsuith  (Roswitha)  of  Ganders- 
heim,  1 1  f. 

Huch,  R.,  285 

Hugo  von  Montfort,  62  f. 

Hugo  von  Trimberg,  54  f. 

Humanism,  67  ff.,  81 

Humboldt,  K.  W.  von,  180 

Hutten,  U.  von,  71 

Hymns  of  ancient  Germans,  4  ; 
Protestant,  66,  70,  86  ff. 

Iffland,  A.  W.,  i5of. 
Immermann,  K.  L.,  239^,  256 
Isidore,  Old  High  German  trans- 
lation of,  7 
Isengrimns,  17 

Jacobi,  F.  H.,  143,  152 
Jager,  J.  (Crotus  Uubianus),  69 
Jean  Paul.     See  Richter,  J.  P.  F. 
Jensen,  W.,  275 
Jordan,  W.,  274 


INDEX. 


Jung  Stilling,  H.,  144 
Jutten,  Spiel  von  Frau,  66 

Kaiserchronik,  Die,  15 
Kalenberg,  Der  Pfaffe  von,  60 
Kant,  I.,  129,  160,  178  f.,  278 
Karsch  (Karschin),  A.  L.,  115 
Kastner,  A.  G.,  in 
Keller,  G. ,  255,  260  f. 
Kerner,  J.,  224 
Kinkel,  G.,  253 
Kirchbach,  W.,  284 
Kirchmayer,    Th.    (Naogeorgus), 

73 

Kirchhoff,  H.  W.,  78 
Klage,  Die,  26 
Kleist,  E.  Ch.  von,  H5f. 
Kleist,  H.  von,  206,  211  ff. 
Klinger,  F.  M.  von,  148  f.,  155 
Klopstock,  F.  G.,  112  ff.,  116  ff. 
Knigge,  A.  von,  133 
Konig,  J.  V.  von,  100 
Konig  Rather,  \$l. 
Konrad  von  Kegensburg,  17,  33 
Konrad  von  Wiirzburg,  44  f. 
Korner,  K.  Th.,  206  f. 
Kortum,  K.  A.,  132 
Kosegarten,  G.  L.,  182  f. 
Kotzebue,  A.  von,  184 
Kretschmann,  K.  F.,  118 
Kretzer,  M.,  285 
Ktidrun,  26  ff. 
Klirenberg,  Herr  von,  18 
Kurz,  H.,  225 
Kurz,  L,  285 

Lamprecht  (Alexander lied),  i6f.. 

33 

Lange,  S.  G. ,  113,  121 
Laroche,  S.  von,  133 
Latin  literature,  10,  72  f. 
Laube,  H.,  242,  247  f. 
Lauremberg,  J. ,  86 
Laurin,  29 
Lavater,  J.  K.,  143 
Leibniz,  G.  W.,  103 
Leisewitz,  J.  A.,  149,  155 
Lenau,  N.,  228  ff. 
Lenz,  J.  M.  R.,  148  f. 
Lessing,  G.  E.,  112,  I2off. ,  135 
Leuthold,  H.,  273 


Leuthold  von  Saben,  51 

Leu/en,  Histori  Peter,  60 

Lichtenberg,  G.  C.,  133 

Lichtwer,  M.  G.,  112 

Liliencron,  D.  von,  280 

Lindener,  M.,  78 

Lindner,  A.,  281 

Lingg,  H.,  273 

Liscow,  C.  L.,  in 

Liturgy,  Old  High  German  trans- 
lations of  the,  7 

Logau,  F.  von,  85 

Lohengrin,  43 

Lohenstein,  D.  K.  von,  96  f.,  100 

Lorm,  H.  (H.  Landesmann),  274 

Lucidaritis ,  55 

Ludwig,  O.,  268 

Ludwigsliedt  Das,  9 

Luther,  M.,  68  ff.,  75,  88 

Lyric  poetry,  beginnings  of,  18, 
47  ff.  See  also  Minnesang  and 
Meistergesang 

Mann,  Th.,  285 

Manuel,  N.,  71,  73 

Marienlieder,  14 

Markolf(Morolf),  16,  60 

Marner,  Der,  64 

Marschner,  H.,  221 

Matthisson,  F   von,  182 

Maximilian  L,  58  f. 

Mayer,  K.    225 

Meiningen  Court  Theatre,  281 

Meinloh  von  Sevelingen,   18 

Meissner,  A.,  252  f. 

Meissner,  A.  G.,  133 

Meistergesang,Meistersingers,63f. 

Melanchthon,  Ph.,  71 

Memento  mori,  14 

Mendelssohn,  M.,  122 f.,  133 

Menzel,  W.,  253 

Mersebiirger  Zauberspriiche,  Die.  6 

Meyer,  K.  F.,  275 

Meyerbeer,  G.  (J.  Beer),  221 

Migrations,     the     (Volkerwande- 

rung),  5  f.,  10,  20 
Miller,  J.  M.,  139,  152 
Minnesang,  18,  47  ff.,  62  f.,  65 
Mommsen,  Th.,  258  f. 
Monseer  Fragmente,  Die,  7 
Montanus,  M.,  78 


INDEX. 


317 


Mtirike,  E.,  225  f. 

Moritz,  K.  Ph.,  152 

Moscherosch,  H.  M.,  91 

Mosen,  J.,  238 

Moser,  J.,  133,  136 

Mozart,  W.  A.,  151,  220  i. 

Miiller,  A.,  206 

Miiller,  F.  (Maler  Miiller),  150 

Miiller,  W.,  237  f. 

Milliner,  A.,  210  f. 

Mundt,  Th.,  242,  248 

Murner,  Th.,  71  f. 

Musaus,  J.  K.  A.,  133 

Music-drama  (opera),  151,  220  f., 

268  ff. 

Muskatblut,  64 
Muspilli,  7 
Mysticism,  14,  67,  87 

Ndfels,  Lied  von  der  Schlacht  bei, 

65 

Naogeorgus     (T.      Kirchmayer), 

73 

Neander,  J.,  102 
Neidhart  Fuchs,  60 
Neidhart  von  Keuental,  51  f. 
Nestroy,  J.,  220 
Neuber,  J.  and  K.,  101 
Neukirch,  B.,  96,  100 
Nibelungenlied,  Das,  21  ff.  ;  later 

versions,  267,  270,  272,  274 
Nicolai,  C.  F.,  122  f. 
Nietzsche,  F.  W.,  278  ff. 
Nissel,  F.,  281 
Notker  of  St  Gall,  12 
Novalis(F.  von  Hardenberg),  193, 

196 

Opitz,  M.,  8 1  ff. 

Oremiel,  16 

Ortnit,  30 

Oswald,  1 6 

Oswald  von  Wolkenstein,  62  f. 

Otfrid,  8  f. 

Palmenorden,     the    (Fruchtbrin- 

gende  Gesellschaft),  83 
Passion  plays,  19 
Patriot,  Der,  105 
Patriotic  lyric,  113  f.,  206  ff. 
Pauli,  J.,  60 


Pegnitzschafer,  the  (Der  gekronte 

Blumenorden),  83 
Petrus,   Bittgesang  an  den  heili- 

gen,  9 

Pfeffel,  G.  K.,  112 
Pfintzing,  M.,  59 
Pfizer,  G.,  225 
Pietsch,  J.  V.,  100 
Platen  -  Hallermiinde,    A.      von, 

2.37  »T. 

Pleier,  Der,  43 
Polenz,  W.  von,  285 
Political  lyric,  249  ff. 
Popular  epic,  20  ff.,  32 
Popular  philosophers,  123,  133 
Prutz,  K.  E.,  249 
Pyra,  I.  J.,  113 

Raabe,  W.,  276 

Rabanus  Maurus,  8 

Rabener,  G.  W.,  109  ff. 

Rabenschlacht ',  Die,  30 

Rachel,  J.,  86 

Radern,   Von  den  vier,  14 

Raimund,  F.,  220 

Ramler,  K.  W.,  115 

Ranke,  L.  von,  258 

Rationalism  ( Aulklarung),  103  f., 

113,  129,  178  f. ,  183 
Raurner,  F.  L.  G.  von,  213 
Raupach,  E.  von,  213 
Rebhtm,  P.,  73 
Red  wit/,  O.  von,  271 
Reformation,  the,  67  ff,  80,  86 
Reformation  drama,  the,  72  ff. 
Regensburg,    Der   Burggraf  von, 

18 

Reimsprecher,  60 
Reinhot  von  Duren,  43 
Remkede  Vos,  61  f.,  166 
Reinmar  von  Hagenau,  49 
Reinmar  von  Zweter,  53 
Renaissance,  the,  68,  74,  79  ff. 
Reuchlin,  J.,  68 
Reuter,  Ch.,  95 
Reuter,  F.,  222,  256  f. 
Richter,    J.    P.    F.    (Jean    Paul), 

180  ff.,  232  f. 
Riehl,  W.  H.,  275 
Ringwalclt,  B.,  78 
Rist,  J.,  83 


INDEX. 


Ritterdramen,     150,     184,    212  : 

Ritterromane,  232 
Robinsonaden,  94,  105  f. 
Rolandslied,  Das,  16  f. 
Rollenhagen,  G.,  78 
Romanticism,    135,    171,   181   ff., 

192  fF.  ;  Decay  of,  231  ff. 
Rosegger,  P.  K.,  256,  285 
Rosen gart en,  Der,  29 
Rosenpliit,  H.,  60,  72 
Roswitha(Hrotsuith),  of  Ganders- 

heim,  II  f. 

Ruckert,  F. ,  207,  236  ff. 
Rudolf  von  Ems,  44  f. 
Runic  alphabet,  4  f. 
Rtiodlieb,  II,  18 

Saar,  F.  von,  275,  281 

Sachs,  Hans,  64,  74  ff. 

Sachsenspiegel,  Der,  55 

Salis-Seewis,  J.  G.  von,  182 

Salman  und  Morolf,  t6 

Schack,  A.  F.  von,  273 

Schede,  P.  (Melissns),  81 

Scheffel,  J.  V.  von,  273 

Schefflei ,  J.  (Angelus  Silesius),  87 

Scheidt,  K.,  76 

Schelling,  F.  W.  J.  von,  199 

Schenkendorf,  M.  von,  206  f. 

Scherer,  W.,  276 

Schernberg,  Th.,  66 

Schiller,J.  F.  von,  154  ff.,  i68f., 
170  ff.  ;  Die  Braut  -von  Mes- 
sina, 174  f.,  210,  215  ;  Don 
Carlos,  142  f. ,  156  ff.  ;  Die 
Jtmgfrau  von  Orleans,  173  f .  ; 
Kabale  und  Liebe,  150,  157; 
Lyric  and  ballad  poetry,  157, 
1 60,  170;  Maria  Stuart,  173; 
Die  Rditber,  143,  155  f.;  Wai- 
lenstein,  92,  169,  171  ff.  ;  Wil- 
helm  Tell,  175  f. 

Schlegel,  A.  W.  von,  141,  193, 
197  f. 

Schlegel,  Caroline  (C.  Schel- 
ling), 197 

Schlegel,  Dorothea,  199 

Schlegel,  F.  von,  193,  197  ff. 

Schlegel,  J.  A.,  109 

Schlegel,  J.  E.,  109  f.,  121 

Schleiermacher,  F.  E.  D.,  199 


Schmid,  F.  von  (Dranmor),  274 
Schnabel,  J.  G.,  106 
Schneckenburger,  M.,  249 
Schnitzler,  A.,  284 
Schonherr,  K.,  284 
School  Comedy,  72  f.,  95 
Schopenhauer,  A.,  218  f.,  254  f., 

270  f.,  274,  278  f. 
Schreyvogel,    J.    (C.    A.    West), 

219. 

Schroder,  F.  L.,  151 
Schubart,  C.  F.  D.,  155 
Schulze,  E.  K.  F.,  237 
Schupp,  J.  B.,  91  f. 
Schwab,  G.,  224  f. 
Schwabenspiegel,  Der,  55 
Schwankdichtung,  45,  60 f.,  77  f. 
Sealsfield.  Ch.  (K.  Postl),  263  f. 
Seifried,   Das  Lied  vom  hitmen, 

59,  65 
Sempacher  Schlacht,  Lied  von  der, 

65 

Seume,  J.  G.,  153 
Seuse  (Suso),  H.,  67 
Shakespeare,    W.,  81,    no,  123, 

126,   130  ff.,    136,    139,   144  f., 

148,   151,   167,    195,   197,  252, 

268 

Sigenot,  29 
Silesian     School,    first,     84    ff.  ; 

second,  96  f. 
Simrock,  K.,  274 
Soden,  F.  J.  H.  von,  150 
Spec,  F.  von,  87  f. 
Spener,  Ph.  J.,  102 
Spervogel,  Der,  19 
Spielhagen,  F. ,  263 
Spielleute  (Spielmann's  epic),  10, 

15,  20,  65 
Spindler,  K. ,  236 
Spruchdichtung,  18  f.,  50  ff,  60, 

6.5 
Steinmar,  52 

Stieglitz,  H.  and  Ch.,  248 

Stifter,  A.,  256 

Stolberg,     C.     and    F.     L.     zu, 

139 

Storm,  Th.,  261  ff. 
Strachwitz,  M.  von,  253 
Strauss,    D.    F.,    247,    254.  262, 

279 


INDEX. 


319 


Strassburger  Eide,  the,  IO 

Strieker,  Der,  45 

Sturm  und  Drang,  114,  116,  119, 

127  ff.,  134  ff.,  142  ff.,  180  f., 

192 

Suchenwirth,  P.,  60 
Sudermann,  H.,  281  ff. 
Swabian  School,  the,  222  ff. 
Swiss   literature,    72   f.,    106   ff., 

236,  256,  260  f.,  275 
Sybel,  H.  von,  258 

Tagelied,  the,  18 

Tannhauser,  Der,  52,  65 

Tatian  (Evangelienharmonie),  7  f. 

Tauler.J.,  67 

Tersteegen,  G.,  102 

Tetterdank,  59 

Theodorich    the   Great  (Dietrich 

von  Bern),  5  f. ,  20 
Theophilus,  66 
Thirty    Years'  War,  the,  79   ff., 

91  ff. 

Thomasin  von  Zirclsere,  54 
Thomasius,  Ch.,  102  f. 
Thummel,  M.  A.  von,  132,  152 
Tieck,  Dorothea,  197 
Tieck,  J.  L.,  193  ff.,  235 
Tiedge,  C.  A.,  183 
Titurel,  Der  jiingere,  43 
Torring,  J.  A.  von,  150 
Treitschke,  H.  von,  276 
Trojanische  Krieg,  Der,  45,  58 

Uhland,  J.  L.,  222  ff. 
Ulfilas  (Wulfila),  4f. 

Ulrich  von  Eschenbach,  45 
Uliich  von  Lichtenstein,  46 
Ulrich  von  Singenberg,  51 
Ulrich  von  Tiirheim,  42 
Ulrich  von  Winterstetten,  52 
Ulrich  von  Zatzikoven,  43 
Uz,  J.  P.,  113  f. 

Varnhagen  von  Ense,  K.  A.,  253 
Vernunftler,  Der,  105 
Viebig,  C.,  285 
Virginal,  29 
Vischer,  F.  Th.,  226  f. 
Volkerwanderung  (Migrations),  5 
Volksbiicher,  59,  78,  225 


Volksdrama  (Posse),  219  f. 
Volksepos.     See  Popular  Epic. 
Volkslied,   the,    64  ff.,    136,  200 

ff.,   223 

Voss,  J.  H.,  138  f.,  169 
Voss,  R.,  284 

Wackenroder,  W.  H.,  194 

Wagner,  H.  L. ,  149 

Wagner,    R.,    221,    265,   268   ff., 

278  f. 

Waiblinger,  W. ,  225 
Waitz,  G.,  258 
Waldis,  B.,  61,  73 
iVa/thari/i'ed,  Das,  10 
Walther     von    der    Vogelweicle, 

48  ff. 

Wappendichter,  60 
Wariburgkrieg,  Der,  63 
Wassermann,  J.,  285 
Weber,  F.  W.,  273  f. 
Weber,  K.  M.  von,  221 
Weckherlin,  G.  R.;  81 
Wedekincl.  P.,  284 
Weise,  Ch..  94  f. 
Weisse,  C.  F.,  122 
Werner,  Z.,  209  f. 
Wernher    (Lied  von    der  Jwig- 

fran],   14 

Wernher  der  Gartencere,  45 
Wernher  von  Elmendorf,  53 
YVernigke,  Ch.,  104 
Wessobrimner  Gebet,  Das,  7 
Wickram,  J.,  77,  90 
Wieland,  C.  M.,  130  ff.,  142,  168 
Wienbarg,  L.,  242 
Wilbrandt,  A.,  275 
Wildenbruch,  E.  von,  281 
Willem  ( Reiuaert  de  Vos),  61 
Willeram  von  Ebersburg,  14 
Wimpfeling,  J.,  68,  72 
Winkelmann,  J.  J. ,  124 
Windesbach,      Herr     von     (Der 

Winsbekc),  53 
Winfrith  (Bonifacius),  7 
Winileod,  9 

Wirnt  von  Gravenberg,  43 
Wisse,  C.,  58 
Wittenweiler,  II.,  60 
Wochenschriften,  moralische,  105 
Wolfdietrich,  30  f. 


320 


INDEX. 


Wolff,  Ch.  von,  103,  105,  in 

Wolff,  J.,  273 

Wolfram   von     Eschenbach,    3" 

35  ff.,  42  f.,  48,  58,  93 
Wulfila  (Ulfilas),  4  f. 
Wyss,  J.  R.,  1 06 

Young  Germany,  241  ff. 


Zacharia,  J.  F.  W.,  109  f. 
Zedlitz,  J.  C.  von,  219,  228 
Zesen,  Ph.  von,  97 
Ziegler.  H.  A.  von,  97  f. 
Zimmermann,  J.  G.,  133 
Zincgref,  J.  W.,  8l 
Zinzendorf,  N.  L.  von,  102 
Zschokke,  H.,  236 


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